The Striking Similarities Between Why Trump’s and Nixon’s Personal Lawyers Were Sent to Prison

On Wednesday, a judge sentenced President Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen to three years in prison. The sentencing comes four months after Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations and admitted that, per Trump’s “direction,” he had directed payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal during the 2016 campaign, in order to prevent their stories of alleged affairs with the then-candidate from getting out. In a statement at the sentencing, Cohen reportedly said that he had acted out of “blind loyalty” to Trump and that he “felt it was [his] duty to cover up his dirty deeds.”

For a White House that has frequently drawn parallels to the turmoil of the Watergate era, Cohen’s sentencing adds one more tick to the list. Herbert W. Kalmbach, President Richard Nixon’s personal lawyer, received a prison sentence on June 17, 1974, exactly two years after the Watergate break-in, for funneling hush money to Watergate defendants.

“In Watergate, he’s the money, the bagman” says Ken Hughes, an expert on Watergate at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center of Public Affairs, who spoke to TIME as part of a presidential-history partnership between TIME History and the Miller Center.