For Cohen, who served prison time for his role in what he said was covering up Trump's "dirty deeds," it was the culmination of a behind-the-scenes detente.
The interview, part of which aired on Thursday evening and which will air in full on Sunday, was an exceptionally friendly affair, with only passing reference to the men's tumultuous history.
"They weaponised you like nobody's ever been weaponised, like few have been," Trump told Cohen.
"I respect the fact that you recanted everything you said," he went on. "That's a big thing that you did."
In an interview with CNN shortly before the radio interview aired, Cohen said he had resubmitted a pardon application to the White House that had been denied by the previous administration, but had yet to receive any response and planned to follow up on Friday.
Cohen once boasted that he would "take a bullet" for the president and was by Trump's side during his political rise. Later, Cohen's testimony in Trump's 2024 hush-money trial helped secure Trump's criminal conviction just as he was trying to make his political comeback.
Cohen has since criticised prosecutors in the case as putting him under pressure— an admission that paved the way for their reconciliation.
Cohen has said he and the president have had multiple conversations over the past year and introduced the interview by talking about forgiveness.
He sounded nostalgic about a time when he was one of Trump's most trusted aides.
"Boss, remember when I was by your side," he said at one point.
In 2024, Cohen was the star witness in Trump's criminal hush money trial.
Over days of probing questioning by prosecutors, followed by bruising cross-examination, Cohen placed the then-Republican candidate at the centre of schemes during the 2016 presidential election to stifle accounts from an adult film actor and former Playboy model who said they had sexual encounters with Trump.
Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison.
He now insists that he had testified under duress.
"I felt pressured and coerced to only provide information and testimony that would satisfy the government's desire to build the cases against and secure a judgement and convictions against President Trump," he wrote in a Substack post in January.
Cohen testified before Congress in 2019, alleging Trump had a history of misrepresenting the value of assets to gain favourable loan terms and tax benefits.
He gave similar testimony in a 2023 civil fraud trial in New York, which found that Trump and his companies had engaged in fraud by exaggerating his wealth for decades. A New York appeals court later threw out a $550 million judgement against Trump in that case. Trump has asked a court to overturn the remaining parts of the case.
In his tell-all memoir in 2020, "Disloyal: The True Story of the Former Personal Attorney to President Donald J. Trump," Cohen was unsparing, calling Trump an "organised crime don" and "master manipulator."
Cohen also wrote that he still cared for Trump, writing, "I had and still have a lot of affection for him."
