During his previous appearance on Tuesday, Cohen was challenged about his evolving attitudes toward his ex-boss, a series of colourful insults dished out on podcasts and social media and the idea that he has profited from publicly attacking the former president through merchandise sales.
The witness remained calm and steadfast during his testimony, also walking the jury through the strategy allegedly employed by Mr Trump’s inner circle to delay making the $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in October 2016 to buy her silence about the sexual encounter she claims he had with the politician in July 2006.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden capitalised on Wednesday’s recess day for the trial to challenge his predecessor to a pair of presidential debates, declaring: “Make my day, pal.”
Mr Trump readily agreed, responding: “Let’s get ready to Rumble!!!”, and the debates are now scheduled for 27 June on CNN and 10 September on ABC.
Alex Woodward is covering the trial from Manhattan Criminal Court.
Here’s the transcript of the recorded conversation between Michael Cohen and Donald Trump:
Michael Cohen: Told you about Charleston. I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend, David, you know, so that -- I’m going to do that right away. I’ve actually come up and I’ve spoken --
Donald J Trump: Give it to me and get me a --
Michael Cohen: And, I’ve spoken to Allen Weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up with --
Donald J Trump: So, what do we got to pay for this? One-fifty?
Michael Cohen: -- funding. Yes. And it’s all the stuff.
Donald J Trump: Yes, I was thinking about that.
Michael Cohen: All the stuff. Because -- here, you never know where that company, you never know what he’s --
Donald J Trump: Maybe he gets hit by a truck
Michael Cohen: Correct. So, I’m all over that. And, I spoke to Allen about it, when it comes time for the financing, which will be --
Donald J Trump: Listen, what financing?
Michael Cohen: We’ll have to pay him something.
Donald J Trump: (INAUDIBLE) pay with cash.
Michael Cohen: No, no, no, no, no, I got it.
Donald J Trump: Check.
Cohen’s recording was interrupted by a phone call with a bank that he answered. He says they continued to speak but he wasn’t recording after that.
Blanche is arguing that when Trump said “cash” during his conversation with Cohen, when Cohen asked about “financing” for the deal with “our friend David,” Trump wasn’t talking about “benjamins or green.”
Kamala Harris agrees to VP debate with Trump’s running mate
Gustaf Kilander reports:
The Biden-Harris campaign said on Thursday that it accepted an invitation from CBS News to take part in a VP debate either on 23 July or 13 August.
This comes after Mr Biden and Mr Trump agreed to take each other on in two presidential debates on 27 June and 10 September to be hosted by CNN and ABC News.
Cohen met Maggie Haberman roughly 20 years ago and had asked her to write positive stories about him.
Blanche asks whether, in exchange, he would give her tips?
“I would use Ms Haberman if the story was something that I believed the New York Times would run. If it wasn’t a Times-style story, I would go to a different outlet.”
Asked if he would record conversations with reporters: “I wouldn’t say a lot.”
Asked how many, he came up with a number very quickly: “40.”
Cohen said he stopped recording conversations in 2016, after the election.
You didn’t record in 2017 or 2018? “I’d have to check.”
Blanche said he will.
“OK.” (said in an almost “okie dokie” kind of way).
Did he ever disclose that?
He doesn’t recall, but notes that “it’s not illegal in New York.” (It’s a so-called one-party state.)
Cohen had a “full rolodex” of reporters, Blanche says.
Cohen agrees.
“You never reached back out to a reporter, ever, without first checking with President Trump?”
“It was my routine to always advise Mr Trump because if the story I was going to put out, 1, it would cause him to blow up at me, and 2, it would be the end of my job.”
“One magazine, one newspaper would pick up the same story, so I would use the same statement over and over and over again. For those I would not tell Mr Trump, I would send to my same list of reporters … We just mimicked the same response to the next magazine, the next newspaper, and so on.”
Blanche is finally correcting that CNN interview / unsealed indictment timeline for the jurors.
He asks Cohen whether by the time he was on CNN the indictment of Trump had been unsealed.
Yes, Cohen responded.
Cohen is now reading through the text messages from Oct 24 with the alleged 14-year-old about the harassing phone calls. The messages are on the screen now and are entered into evidence.
Interior minister says suspect charged with attempted murder is ‘lone wolf’ who had joined anti-government protests.
Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico is stable but his condition remains “very serious”, his deputy has said, after an assassination attempt that shocked the country and drew global condemnation.
Fico, 59, was shot five times in the central town of Handlova on Wednesday after he left a government meeting. He was in critical condition and underwent several hours of emergency surgery.
“During the night, doctors managed to stabilise the patient’s condition,” Deputy Prime Minister Robert Kalinak said on Thursday.
“Unfortunately, the condition is still very serious as the injuries are complicated,” said Kalinak, who is also the defence minister.
Miriam Lapunikova, the director of the FD Roosevelt University Hospital in Banska Bystrica where Fico was being treated, said he “had multiple gunshot wounds, the consequences of which will affect his recovery”.
“At this point, his condition has stabilised, but it is truly very serious, and therefore he will remain in the intensive care unit,” she added.
Later on Thursday, President-elect Peter Pellegrini, who won election in April, said he had spoken with Fico.
“He is able to speak but only a few sentences and then he is really tired because he is on some medication,” he told reporters.
The alleged attacker, a 71-year-old writer and former security guard, has been charged with attempted murder, said Al Jazeera’s Natacha Butler, reporting from Bankska Bystrica.
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok told a news conference that the suspect had acted alone and had previously taken part in anti-government protests.
“This is a lone wolf who had radicalised himself … after the presidential election,” he said, referring to the vote won by Pellegrini.
“Slovak police are working with a single version of the attack and the suspect is charged with attempted murder with premeditation,” Sutaj Estok told reporters, adding that the attack was “politically motivated”.
President Zuzana Caputova called for a calming of political tensions and said she would invite all parliamentary party leaders for a joint meeting.
“Let’s step out of the vicious circle of hatred and mutual accusations,” she said on Thursday. “What happened yesterday was an individual act but the tense atmosphere of hatred has been our collective work.”
Pellegrini called on all parties to suspend or reduce campaigning before the European Parliament elections scheduled for June.
A man is arrested after Slovak PM Robert Fico was shot multiple times, in Handlova, Slovakia [File: Radovan Stoklasa/Reuters]
Following the attack, Fico was rushed to a hospital in Handlova but was soon transferred by helicopter to the regional capital, Banska Bystrica, for urgent treatment.
Reacting to the incident, Russia said it considered the attack “absolutely unacceptable”.
“This is really a great tragedy,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday.
Fico’s European counterparts, including Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, condemned the shooting and wished him a complete recovery.
The country of 5.4 million has seen polarised political debate in recent years, including last year’s presidential election that helped Fico tighten his grip on power.
Since returning as prime minister last October, his government has scaled back support for Ukraine while opening up dialogue with Russia, looked to lessen punishments for corruption, and is revamping the RTVS public broadcaster despite a call to protect media freedoms.
Fico is Slovakia’s longest-serving political leader and ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The US military has finished installing a floating pier for the Gaza Strip.
It means officials are now poised to begin ferrying badly needed humanitarian aid into the enclave besieged over seven months of intense fighting in the Israel-Hamas war.
The construction was finished overnight, AP reported, and sets up a complicated delivery process more than two months after Joe Biden ordered it to help Palestinians facing starvation.
Recently, food and other supplies have failed to make it in to Gaza as Israel recently seized the key Rafah border crossing in its push on that southern city on the Egyptian border.
US troops facilitating aid delivery through the pier will not set foot in Gaza, American officials insist, though they acknowledge the danger of operating near the war zone.
The Reuters news agency has been told by two Egyptian sources that Egypt has rejected an Israeli proposal for the two countries to coordinate to re-open the Rafah crossing between Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip.
Officials from Israeli security service Shin Bet presented the plan on a visit to Cairo on Wednesday, amid rising tension between the two countries following Israel’s military advance last week into Rafah, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced by war have been sheltering.
The Rafah crossing has been a main conduit for humanitarian aid entering Gaza, and an exit point for medical evacuees from the territory, where a humanitarian crisis has deepened and some people are at risk of famine.
Israel took operational control of the crossing and has said it will not compromise on preventing Hamas having any future role there.
The Israeli proposal included a mechanism for how to manage the crossing after an Israeli withdrawal, the security sources said. Egypt insists the crossing should be managed only by Palestinian authorities, Reuters added.
An Israeli official who requested anonymity said the delegation travelled to Egypt “mainly to discuss matters around Rafah, given recent developments”, but declined to elaborate.
Egypt’s foreign press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Israel’s economy has recovered sharply in the first quarter of 2024 after a steep contraction in late 2023 that followed the start of the war.
The Central Bureau of Statistics has said in an initial estimate that gross domestic product (GDP) grew 14.1% in the January to March period.
Growth was led by a rebound in consumer spending and renewed investment, particularly in residential building.
The fourth-quarter of 2023 saw GDP contract 21.7%.
Here are some more images of the floating pier – which was installed today – while it was under construction. It is reported to have cost the US military $230m (£182m).
Last night, a US interior department staffer became the first Jewish political appointee to publicly resign in protest of US support for Israel’s war in Gaza.
Lily Greenberg Call, a special assistant to the chief of staff in the interior department, accused Joe Biden of using Jewish people to justify US policy in the conflict.
Call had worked for the presidential campaigns of both Biden and Kamala Harris, and was a longtime activist and advocate for Israel in Washington and elsewhere before joining the government.
She is at least the fifth mid- or senior-level administration staffer to make public their resignation in protest of the Biden administration’s military and diplomatic support of the now seven-month Israeli war against Hamas.
She is the second political appointee to do so, after an education department official of Palestinian heritage resigned in January.
Her resignation letter described her excitement at joining an administration that she believed shared much of her vision for the country. “However, I can no longer in good conscience continue to represent this administration,” she wrote.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group says it has launched “more than 60” rockets at Israeli military positions in retaliation for overnight air strikes on the country’s east, AFP reports
Israel and Hamas ally Hezbollah have exchanged near-daily fire following the Palestinian group’s October 7 attack on southern Israel that sparked the war in Gaza, now in its eighth month.
Hezbollah fighters “launched a missile attack with more than 60 Katyusha rockets” on several Israeli military positions in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, the group said in a statement.
The strikes were “in response to the Israeli enemy’s attacks last night on the Bekaa region” in eastern Lebanon’s Baalbek area, the group added.
Earlier on Thursday, Lebanese state-run media reported an overnight Israeli air raid on the Baalbek area, where Hezbollah holds sway, hours after the group launched an attack deep into Israeli territory.
On Wednesday, Unwra, the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, said almost 600,000 people had fled Rafah following evacuation orders last week amid mounting international pressure on Israel to halt its offensive on the densely populated city.
The Israeli military distributed leaflets to more than a million Palestinians who had initially sought refuge in Rafah from fighting in other parts of the Gaza Strip. Satellite images obtained via Maxar show sprawling tent cities emerging west of Khan Younis city and near the al-Mawasi “humanitarian zone”.
In al-Mawasi, a narrow part of Gaza’s coastline designated as a “safe zone” by Israel’s army, hundreds of tents popped up between 4th May and 15th May.
Northwest of Rafah displaced Palestinians have also had to set up makeshift camps.
Khan Younis, a city already devastated by months of fighting, is also once again hosting large displaced population of Palestinians seeking safety from Israel’s expanding offensive. Here are two satellite images superimposed on one another of Aqsa Khan University, around 5 km from Khan Younis’s center.
Palestinian lorry drivers delivering aid to Gaza have described “barbaric” scenes after their vehicles were blocked and vandalised by Israeli settlers, preventing humanitarian supplies reaching the territory where much of the population face imminent starvation.
Drivers and contractors who were targeted on Monday at the Tarqumiya checkpoint in the occupied West Bank also said Israeli soldiers escorting the convoy did nothing to stop the attack.
The incident sparked international condemnation after videos emerged on social media that appeared to show Israeli settlers throwing boxes of much-needed supplies on the ground and at least one vehicle being set ablaze.
Yazid al-Zoubi, 26, said between 50 and 60 lorries had set out in the convoy.
“We were carrying oil, sugar and other things and driving from the Tarqumiya crossing,” he said. “We left in a convoy with an army vehicle in front of us and an army vehicle behind us, and we took a special army road that civilians could not cross. Suddenly, after 20 minutes on the road, near the crossing, we were surprised by at least 400 settlers. They attacked us. The rest of the drivers and I escaped from the vehicles after the settlers starting throwing stones at us.’’
Today, the United Nations’ top court is opening two days of hearings into a request from South Africa to press Israel to halt its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
More than half of Gaza’s population has sought shelter in Rafah.
This is the fourth time South Africa has asked the International Court of Justice for emergency measures since it launched proceedings alleging that Israel’s military action in its war with Hamas in Gaza amounts to genocide.
It says the previous preliminary orders by The Hague-based court were not sufficient to address a “brutal military attack on the sole remaining refuge for the people of Gaza”.
We briefly reported earlier on the split in Israel’s war cabinet. Here is Peter Beaumont’s report on the situation:
A long-festering split at the heart of Israel’s war cabinet has burst into the open with the defence minister, Yoav Gallant, challenging the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to come up with plans for the “day after” the war in Gaza, and saying he would not permit any solution where Israeli military or civil governance were in the territory.
Gallant’s comments, immediately backed by his fellow minister Benny Gantz, plunged Israel’s leadership into a highly public row, in the midst of the Gaza conflict, raising immediate speculation over his future in the Israeli government and of Netanyahu’s fractious coalition.
In uncompromising remarks, Gallant – whose firing last year by Netanyahu triggered mass protests, a political crisis and an eventual reversal by the PM – publicly demanded that Netanyahu describe plans for a “day-after plan” for Gaza.
Gallant’s comments provoked an immediate political row, with Netanyahu pushing back rapidly with a videotaped statement and a call from the far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, for Gallant to be replaced.
Gallant was backed, however, by his fellow senior minister Benny Gantz, a former chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces, who said Gallant had spoken the “truth”.
Five soldiers have been killed by friendly fire in Gaza’s north, where intense fighting has resumed more than seven months into the war.
The troops were killed on Wednesday at 7pm local in the area of Jabalia refugee camp, the IDF said in a statement. Seven other troops were wounded in the incident.
The statement read:
Five soldiers of the 202nd Paratrooper Battalion were killed last night in a mass casualty incident as a result of fire by our forces.
It continued:
The shooting consisted of two tank shells. From the initial investigation... it appears that the tank fighters, from the ultra-Orthodox paratrooper company Hetz, identified a gun barrel coming out of one of the windows in the building, and directed each other to shoot at the building.
Here are some of the latest images from photographers on the ground in Gaza:
Fraught with logistical, weather and security challenges, delivering aid via the maritime route and floating pier is designed to bolster the amount of aid getting into the Gaza Strip, AP reports
Crucially, however, it is not considered a substitute for far cheaper land-based deliveries that aid agencies say are much more sustainable.
Boatloads of aid will be deposited at a port facility built by the Israelis just southwest of Gaza City and then distributed by aid groups.
Israeli forces will be in charge of security on the shore, but there are also two US Navy warships near the area in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, the USS Arleigh Burke and the USS Paul Ignatius. Both ships are destroyers equipped with a wide range of weapons and capabilities to protect American troops off shore and US allies on the beach.
The first cargo ship loaded with 475 pallets of food left Cyprus last week to rendezvous with a US military ship Off the coast of Gaza. The Pentagon said moving the aid between ships was an effort to be ready so it could flow quickly once the pier and the causeway were installed.
The installation of the pier several miles off the coast and of the causeway, which is now anchored to the beach, was delayed for nearly two weeks because of bad weather and high seas. The sea conditions made it too dangerous for US and Israeli troops to secure the causeway to the shore and do other final assembly work, US officials said.
The US military has finished installing a floating pier for the Gaza Strip.
It means officials are now poised to begin ferrying badly needed humanitarian aid into the enclave besieged over seven months of intense fighting in the Israel-Hamas war.
The construction was finished overnight, AP reported, and sets up a complicated delivery process more than two months after Joe Biden ordered it to help Palestinians facing starvation.
Recently, food and other supplies have failed to make it in to Gaza as Israel recently seized the key Rafah border crossing in its push on that southern city on the Egyptian border.
US troops facilitating aid delivery through the pier will not set foot in Gaza, American officials insist, though they acknowledge the danger of operating near the war zone.
We are restarting the Guardian’s live coverage of the Israel-Gaza war.
Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh has rejected any postwar settlement in Gaza that excludes the group, saying “the movement [Hamas] will decide, along with all national factions, the administration of the Gaza Strip after the war.”
He also blamed Israel for a deadlock in Gaza ceasefire negotiations and said that any agreement must provide a framework for a permanent end to Israel’s offensive in the enclave.
His comments come as a split in Israel’s war cabinet was made public, with the defence minister, Yoav Gallant, challenging prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to come up with plans for the “day after” the war in Gaza, saying he would not permit any solution where Israeli military or civil governance were in the territory.
Here’s a summary of the day’s other main events.
Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel must do “what is required” in Rafah despite disagreements with its longtime ally the US. The Israeli prime minister, in an interview with CNBC, acknowledged a “disagreement” with Washington over his country’s military offensive in the southernmost Gaza city, but he stood firm that the operation would be necessary.
The Israeli leader said that it is pointless to “talk about the day after while Hamas is still intact.” “There is only one substitute for victory – defeat. My government will not agree to this,” Netanyahu said on Wednesday, according to Reuters. Netanyahu also repeated his claim that there is not a humanitarian crisis in southern Gaza.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said Israel must have a clear and concrete plan for the future of Gaza. Blinken, in a press conference in Kyiv on Wednesday, said that the US “do not support and will not support an Israeli occupation”, adding that “we can’t have a vacuum in Gaza that’s likely to be filled by chaos.”
Turkey’s foreign minister, Hakan Fidan, told his US counterpart, Antony Blinken, that Israel’s attack on the Gazan city of Rafah is unacceptable, according to a Turkish diplomatic source. In a call on Wednesday, Fidan also told Blinken that it was important to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza as soon as possible.
The UN has run out of tents and food to distribute to almost 2 million people in Gaza. UN officials told the Guardian that their warehouses were now completely empty south of the river dividing the northern third of the Gaza from the south, with no likelihood of resupply as long as the main entry points into the territory remain closed after Israeli offensives launched in recent days.
The International Rescue Committee (IRC) has said it faces “significant disruptions” to its humanitarian operations due to Israel’s recent ground operations in Rafah. In a statement, the organisation said “the closure of the Rafah crossing and a blockade on entry of humanitarian workers and aid, including fuel, [is] critically hindering our ability to deliver essential services and aid to those in desperate need”.
The 71-year-old suspect, believed to be a former security guard, faces up to 25 years in prison after the “politically motivated” attack, local news reported.
Deputy prime minister Tomas Taraba said the operation “went well” and added: “I guess in the end he will survive. He’s not in a life-threatening situation at this moment.”
After being treated briefly at a local hospital, Mr Fico was airlifted to Banska Bystrica Hospital where he was seen being carried on a gurney.
Mr Fico, a well-known ally of Russian president Vladimir Putin, is a divisive figure in Slovak politics, with the European Union Parliament elections due to take place in three weeks.
The Slovakian police have urged “respect and tolerance” after comments appeared on social media approving of Robert Fico’s assassination.
On social media, the Slovakian police said: “In the comments below the post about yesterday’s event, there are also those that approve of crime and those that spread hate.
“We evaluate these posts and if they meet the actual essence of the crime or offense, we will take action. Avoiding punishment is so simple.
“Respect and tolerance are all you need. There are two words that everyone should follow when communicating, and not only on social networks.
“It should also be a standard in everyday life, where respect, decency, dignity and other virtues of daily life belong. Thank you.”
Russia’s Medvedev praises Fico for ‘reasonable’ positions on Russia
Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev praised Slovakian prime minister Robert Fico, who was wounded in an attempted assassination on Wednesday.
He said there were few politicians like him in Europe and that he had “reasonable” positions regarding Russia.
Fico, 59, returned to power in Slovakia last year. Having previously served twice as prime minister, from 2006 to 2010 and again from 2012 to 2018, his third term, won in September last year, made him the longest-serving head of government in Slovakia’s history.
After the win in 2006 – two years after Slovakia joined the EU – Fico kept the nation on course to adopt the Euro in 2009 despite forming a government with nationalists.
Fico and Smer have most often been described as left-populist, though he has also been compared to right-wing politicians like the nationalist prime minister of neighboring Hungary, Viktor Orban.
Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said Fico had a ‘reasonable’ position on Russia (Sputnik)
A man has been charged with attempted murder after Slovakian prime minister Robert Fico was shot in the stomach in an assassination attempt.
The 71-year-old suspect, believed to be a former security guard, faces up to 25 years in prison after the “politically motivated” attack, local news reported.
Mr Fico, 59, was injured after five shots were fired outside the House of Culture in the town of Handlova where the leader was meeting with supporters.
The 71-year-old suspect, believed to be a former security guard, faces up to 25 years in prison after the “politically motivated” attack (RTVS/AFP via Getty Images)
‘Left wing populist’: What does Robert Fico believe?
During a three-decade career, Fico has skilfully weaved between pro-European mainstream and nationalistic anti-Brussels and anti-American positions, while showing a willingness to change course depending on public opinion or changed political realities.
Polling at around 10 per cent in 2020, the Covid pandemic opened a door for Fico, who sought to address voter fears in slamming government health measures.
At the same time he a tapped into dissatisfaction with bickering in the ruling government and raised doubts with its pro-Western course, chiming with pro-Russian narratives on social networks that had spread across Slovakia.
Slovak prime minister Robert Fico is wheeled to hospital after he was shot and injured (Tlačová agentúra SR)
Fico has run the Smer-SD party since 1999 after establishing it to oppose the reformist centre-right cabinet. He had been turned down for a ministerial post by the Democratic Left, the political heirs to the Communist Party.
Fico, 59, returned to power in Slovakia last year. Having previously served twice as prime minister, from 2006 to 2010 and again from 2012 to 2018, his third term, won in September last year, made him the longest-serving head of government in Slovakia’s history.
After the win in 2006 – two years after Slovakia joined the EU – Fico kept the nation on course to adopt the Euro in 2009 despite forming a government with nationalists.
Fico and Smer have most often been described as left-populist, though he has also been compared to right-wing politicians like the nationalist prime minister of neighboring Hungary, Viktor Orban.
Slovak prime minister Robert Fico speaks during a press conference, before a shooting incident where he was wounded, in Handlova, Slovakia, 15 May 2024 (Reuters)
Born to a working-class family in September 1964, Slovakian prime minister Robert Fico graduated with a law degree in 1986 and joined the then-ruling Communist party.
After the 1989 Velvet Revolution that led to the break up of former Czechoslovakia, he worked as a government lawyer and represented Slovakia at the European Court for Human Rights.
During a three-decade career, Fico has moved between pro-European mainstream and nationalistic positions opposed to European Union and US foreign policy.
Slovakian prime minister Robert Fico graduated with a law degree in 1986 and joined the then-ruling Communist party (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)
Slovak PM Fico's condition stabilised but serious, says hospital director
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico’s condition is stabilised but remains serious, a hospital director said on Thursday, after an assassination attempt the previous day.
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By Malu Cursino & Sarah Rainsford, in Bratislava
BBC News
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is no longer in a life-threatening condition after being shot several times, the deputy prime minister has said.
Tomas Taraba told the BBC Mr Fico's surgery had gone "well" and "I guess that at the end he will survive".
Earlier Mr Fico, 59, was said to have been "fighting for his life" after being gravely injured in the attack in the small town of Handlova.
A suspect was detained at the scene of the shooting.
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estoka described it as a politically motivated assassination attempt.
Mr Fico is a divisive figure at home - and controversial in the EU - for his calls to end military aid to Ukraine and sanctions on Russia.
But condemnation of the shooting has come from far and wide and it has been described as an attack on democracy.
Gunman fired at close range
The gunman was in a small crowd of Fico supporters who were gathered outside a cultural centre in Handlova, where the prime minister had been holding a meeting.
The shooting took Mr Fico's security officers completely by surprise. Footage shows the prime minister after he was shot being carried by several officers, who bundle him into a car and drive him away from the scene.
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The gunman fired five shots at close range and Mr Fico was hit in the stomach and in the arm.
Following the shooting, he was rushed to hospital and spent several hours in surgery "fighting for his life", according to Defence Minister Robert Kalinak.
There has been no official update on the prime minister's condition since then, but his second-in-command has since told the BBC's Newshour programme that Mr Fico was "not in [a] life-threatening situation at this moment".
"As far as I know, the operation went well and I guess that at the end he will survive," Mr Taraba said.
Mr Taraba added that the prime minister was shot "from very close" and that "one bullet went through the stomach and the second one hit the joint".
Police have not yet identified the alleged suspect. Unconfirmed local media reports say he was a 71-year-old writer and political activist.
A video being widely circulated on Slovak media purports to feature the suspect.
In the footage, the man says he disagrees with government policy and its stance towards state media. The BBC does not know if the person in the video is the perpetrator who was detained at the scene nor the circumstances under which it was filmed.
The shooting came on the day parliament began discussing the government's proposal to abolish Slovakia's public broadcaster RTVS.
Thousands of Slovaks have protested against the proposed reform of the public broadcaster in recent weeks. However, a planned opposition-led demonstration was called off on Wednesday as news of the shooting emerged.
Getty Images
In his interview with the BBC, Deputy Prime Minister Taraba blamed "false narratives" by opposition parties in Slovakia for the shooting.
"Our prime minister several times mentioned in the past that he was afraid that this would happen," Mr Taraba said in another interview with the BBC's World Tonight programme.
According to him, Mr Fico had warned that the way in which "the government was attacked by false narratives can overheat the reaction of people and lead to something like this".
Parliament was sitting at the time of the attack and Slovak media reported that a party colleague of Mr Fico's shouted at opposition MPs, accusing them of stoking the attack.
And Interior Minister Mr Estok accused the media of contributing to the climate that led to the 59-year-old's shooting, telling a press conference: "Many of you were those who were sowing this hatred."
Mr Estok added that he believed "this assassination [attempt] was politically motivated".
Reacting to news of the attack, Slovakia's outgoing President Zuzana Caputova said something "so serious had happened that we can't even realise it yet".
"The hateful rhetoric we witness in society leads to hateful acts," she added.
Mr Fico returned to power in Slovakia after elections last September, as the head of a populist-nationalist coalition.
His first few months as prime minister have proved highly contentious, both in Slovakia and in the EU. In January he halted military aid to Ukraine and last month pushed through plans to abolish RTVS.
