In a statement released on Wednesday, Swiss drug manufacturing company Novartis AG (NYSE:NVS) announced that one of its lawyers will be leaving the company due to the companies recent agreement with Michael D. Cohen —US President Donald Trump’s lawyer.

Felix R. Ehrat, who has been with the company since 2011, will be stepping down from his position as a member of the Novartis Executive Committee and as a Group General Counselor. 

According to the statement, Ehrat will be “[retiring] from his position based on recent discussions surrounding Novartis’ former agreement with Essential Consultants, owned by Michael Cohen.”

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Shannon Thyme Klinger, the company’s current Chief Ethics, Risk and Compliance Officer will be replacing Ehrat, as of June 1, 2018. Klinger has been with the company since 2011 when she was hired as General Counsel for the North American sector of Novartis. 

A recent Bloomberg article stated that Novartis had made approximately $1.2 billion USD in payments to Cohen in an agreement signed by Ehrat and Novartis former-CEO, Joe Jimenez.

Novartis hired Cohen as a consultant and, although he did not deliver on the results they were expecting, the company still paid him for a one-year contract which ended in February 2018.

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Ehrat has said that “although the contract was legally in order, it was an error” and “as a co-signatory with [the company’s] former CEO, [he] [takes] personal responsibility to bring the public debate on this matter to an end.”

The company’s new CEO, Vas Narasimhan has said in a conference call with company managers on Monday that Novartis needed to rebuild trust with the public, according to Bloomberg.

The share value of Novartis only went up today by 0.19% closing at $77.60. The Swiss company was able to reach a high share value of $78.05 and a low of 77.55.

This is very little change as the company closed at $77.45 on Tuesday.

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