A message from Randall
To: All AT&T employees worldwide
Team,
Our company has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons these last few days and our reputation
has been damaged. There is no other way to say it - AT&T hiring Michael Cohen as a political consultant
was a big mistake.
To be clear, everything we did was done according to the law and entirely legitimate. But the fact is, our
past association with Cohen was a serious misjudgment. In this instance, our Washington D.C. team's
vetting process clearly failed, and I take responsibility for that. Here is more information on this issue, if
you're interested.
For the foreseeable future, the External & Legislative Affairs (E&LA) group will report to our General
Counsel David McAtee. Bob Quinn, Senior Executive Vice President - E&LA, will be retiring.
David's number one priority is to ensure every one of the individuals and firms we use in the political
arena are people who share our high standards and who we would be proud to have associated with
AT&T.
To all of you who work tirelessly every day to serve customers and represent the brand proudly, thank
you. My personal commitment to you is - we will do better.

 Facts around AT&T & Michael Cohen
o

In early 2017, as President Trump was taking office, AT&T hired several consultants to
help us understand how the President and his administration might approach a wide
range of policy issues important to the company, including regulatory reform at the FCC,
tax reform, and antitrust enforcement, specifically our Time Warner deal. Companies
often hire political consultants, especially at the beginning of a new presidential
administration, and we have done so in previous administrations.

o

Michael Cohen approached our External Affairs organization during the post-election
transition period and said he was going to leave the Trump Organization and do
consulting for a select few companies that wanted his opinion on the new President and
his administration - the key players, their priorities, and how they think.

o

Our Washington DC team hired Cohen for just that purpose, under a one-year contract
at $50,000 per month, from January through December 2017. Our contract with Cohen
was expressly limited to providing consulting and advisory services, and it did not permit
him to lobby on our behalf without first notifying us (which never occurred). We didn't
ask him to set up any meetings for us with anyone in the Administration and he didn't
offer to do so.

o

When we were contacted by the Special Counsel's office regarding Michael Cohen, we
cooperated fully, providing all information requested in November and December of
2017. Since then, we have received no additional questions from the Special Counsel's
office and have considered the matter closed.