Seven days after Michael Cohen finalized the nondisclosure agreement with Stormy Daniels, the Wall Street Journal published a story about Stormy Daniels and AMI's $150,000 payment to Karen McDougal.

Cohen testified that he knew about it in advance, and when he found out he responded by "contacting Keith Davidson.," Daniels' attorney.

Cohen said he also talked with Trump aide Hope Hicks and National Enquirer publisher David Pecker "so that we could all coalesce around this issue." In a series of calls and emails Cohen said he suggested a response, blaming the "liberal media" and the Clinton campaign.

Cohen said he reacted angrily to Davidson when the Journal story came out, suspecting Davidson leaked the story.

"I wanted to ensure Mr. Trump was safe," Cohen told jurors.

Cohen said that he conveyed to Davidson that Trump was "really angry."

The night the Journal story came out, Cohen said he spoke to Trump just after 9 p.m. for about six minutes. The jury saw a record of the call.

"This was a real serious, again, problem, especially being so close to the election," Cohen recalled saying. He tried to reassure Trump that he, David Pecker and Dylan Howard at the National Enquirer and Keith Davidson were "doing everything in our power to protect Mr. Trump."

But Cohen told jurors he was concerned about the story "because there was a negative story that once again could impact the campaign as a result of women."

Jurors saw the finalized nondisclosure agreement between Trump and Stormy Daniels, guaranteeing Daniels $130,000 for her silence.

Cohen signed the document on behalf of Essential Consultants.

The agreement used pseudonyms for Trump and Daniels -- Trump's being David Dennison and Daniels' being Peggy Peterson.

"The purpose of it was to ensure his name didn't appear anywhere, as he is a candidate for the presidency of the United States of America," Daniels said.

Donald Trump's name briefly appeared on a side letter agreement to confirm that he was the David Dennison mentioned in the contract.

Both Davidson and Cohen were permitted to have a copy of the side letter agreement.

Jurors then saw a phone record showing a five-minute phone call between Cohen and Trump on Oct. 28, 2016.

Cohen said he told Trump that "this matter was now completely under control and locked down pursuant to the nondisclosure agreement."

Jurors saw the form that Michael Cohen used to create the account for Essential Consultants LLC, the shell company he used to pay Stormy Daniels the $130,000 per their nondisclosure agreement.

"MICHAEL COHEN IS OPENING ESSENTIAL CONSULTANTS LLC AS A REAL ESTATE CONSULTING COMPANY TO COLLECT FEES FOR INVESTMENT CONSULTING WORK HE DOES FOR REAL ESTATE DEALS," the form said.

Asked about the veracity of the form, Cohen responded, "It's false."

Cohen said he filled out the form that way "to hide the intent ... which is to pay for a nondisclosure agreement."

Cohen said had he been honest on the form, the account would not have been opened by First Republic Bank.

Prosecutor Susan Hoffinger then walked Cohen through each of the documents used to create the shell company then wire $130,000 to an attorney-trust account for Stormy Daniels.

Cohen stated that wire transfer form he used for the payment was not truthful because it stated the purpose of the wire was a "retainer."

In reality, Cohen said, the wire was "in order to pay Stormy Daniels to execute the nondisclosure agreement and to attain the story -- her life rights."

Jurors saw phone records showing a flurry of calls made by Michael Cohen in late October 2016, as Cohen finalized the Stormy Daniels payment.

The records included Cohen's calls between Keith Davidson, Allen Weisselberg, and David Pecker.

Jurors also saw a record of two phone calls Cohen made to Trump on Oct. 26, 2016, with durations of 3:01 and 1:28.

"I wanted to ensure that once again he approved what he was doing, because I required approval from him on all of this," Cohen said about the calls.

"Everything required Mr. Trump's sign-off," Cohen said. "On top of that I wanted the money back.

Jurors saw an April 21, 2018, email where Michael Cohen's attorney at the time, Robert Costello, told Cohen, "Sleep well tonight, you have friends in high places."

"The friend in high places was President Trump," Cohen testified.

"It let me know that I was still important to the team, and stay the course, that the president had my back," Cohen said about Costello's emails.

Jurors then saw another email from Costello dated June 13, 2018.

"Since you jumped off the phone rather abruptly, I did not get a chance to tell you that my friend has communicated to me that he is meeting with his client this evening and he added that if there was anything you wanted to convey, you should tell me and my friend will bring it up for discussion this evening," Costello wrote.

According to Cohen, the aforementioned client was Donald Trump.

Asked about the vagueness of the email, Cohen testified that it was "sort of to be covert -- it is all back channel. Sort of eye spy-ish. Didn't want to put anybody's name."

Jurors then saw a June 2018 email between Cohen and Costello that suggested their relationship had begun to fray.

"I must tell you quite frankly that I am not used to listening to abuse like today's conversation," Costello wrote, referencing an "unfortunate outburst" by Cohen.

"Please remember if you want or need to communicate something, please let me know and I will see that it gets done. I hope I am not wrong but it seems to both Jeff and I that perhaps we have been played here," Costello wrote, referencing the back channel to Trump.

Cohen told the jury he was concerned about his communications with Costello making their way to Trump, and he began looking for other lawyers.

Cohen said Costello was "again pressuring me as he had done with constant calls and sending me emails and so on. He wanted to absolutely be retained to represent me in this matter. He was angered that I was willing to sit down with another attorney but not sit down with them, so I had enough."