Stormy Daniels has stirred a scene in on Capitol Hill this month, suing President Donald Trump on Tuesday in an effort to throw out her non-disclosure agreement.
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, 38, was paid $130,000 in the agreement, money that Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen said came from his own pockets and not the Trump administration.
Daniel’s lawyer Michael Avenatti sat with anchor Anderson Cooper to call Cohen’s transaction, which was allegedly not authorized by President Trump, utter ‘nonsense’.
Stormy Daniel’s lawyer Michael Avenatti (left) posted this image on Twitter to announce that the porn star (center) would break her silence for the first time on 60 Minutes with Anderson Cooper (right)
Avenatti (above) spoke on CNN in response to Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen’s claims that he paid Daniels the $130,000 using money from his home equity line funds
Stormy Daniels’ lawyer on Trump’s lawyer’s explanation of porn star payment: “Nonsense, ridiculous, preposterous, ludicrous… we are out of words to describe what Mr. Cohen is trying to sell to the American public” https://t.co/ZRDxDJTGxh https://t.co/sIHHTdGSPW
— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) March 10, 2018
On CNN Cooper asked Avenatti’s response to Cohen’s claim that he paid the handsome fee using funds from his home equity line in 2016.
‘We have heard explanation upon explanation. They are ever changing. It’s nonsense. I’m running out of superlatives. Your legal analysts are running out of superlatives…,’ Avenatti said on CNN.
‘Nonsense, ridiculous, preposterous, ludicrous…the list goes on and on. We are out of words to describe what Mr Cohen is trying to sell to the American public. Anderson, it is impossible, it is so out of the realm of possibility that this attorney undertook all of this work,’ he added.
He then described that it would have been impossible for Cohen to undertake the extensive work of a non-disclosure agreement without the consultation or authorization of Trump.
‘This took a long time. The negotiation, the drafting, the communication, the routing of the payment. We’re talking about hours and hours and hours,’ Avenatti said.
Donald Trump and porn Stormy Daniels aka Stephanie Clifford pose together in 2006. Daniels has come forward saying that the two shared an intimate relationship from 2006 to 2007 around the time that Melania gave birth to son Barron
Despite accepting the six-figure payment, Clifford, a.k.a. Daniels, is suing the president to nullify her nondisclosure agreement, saying it’s invalid because Trump never actually signed it
Michael Cohen (above) says that his transaction had nothing to do with the Trump organization despite his payment being linked to his Trump email account
‘What Mr Cohen and the administration expects the American public to believe is that he went off half-cocked on his own without any guide of communication whatsoever with his client. None. He just decided that he was going to do this,’ he added.
Cohen said last month in a public statement that ‘[n]either the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly. The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful, and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone.’
His transaction, however, was linked to his Trump work e-mail.
The email connection could be used against Cohen’s claims that he paid the star with his own money.
He released another statement saying: ‘The earth-shattering uncovered email between myself and the bank corroborates all my previous statements; which is I transferred money from one account at that bank into my LLC and then wired said funds to Ms. Clifford’s attorney in Beverly Hills, California. How Mr. Avenatti or the media at large believes this to be “breaking news” is a mystery to me.’
He released a statement saying that the money came just from himself, something Avenatti described as ‘nonsense’ and ‘ridiculous’
Avenatti has spoken to several media outlets expressing outrage at the claims that Cohen acted alone and could have created the NDA without Trump’s authorization
Speaking to Cooper he said: ‘What Mr Cohen and the administration expects the American public to believe is that he went off half-cocked on his own without any guide of communication whatsoever with his client. None’
Later in the CNN interview, Cooper asks Avenatti what the porn star wanted to achieve through this lawsuit.
He said she wants to exercise her freedom of speech and to set the record straight and let the American people judge for themselves.
The controversy was sparked when Daniels came forward to say that she had an ‘intimate’ relationship with Trump from 2006 to 2007 that began shortly after Melania gave birth to their only son Barron.
In her lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court she included the NDA as well as a side letter.
The NDA refers to Trump as David Dennison and Daniels as Peggy Peterson. The side letter reveals these pseudonyms to be Trump and Daniels.
The NDA, as well as a side letter, that she signed is shown as exhibits in her lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court.
On Thursday Avenatti posted a photo of himself with Daniels and Cooper hinting that the porn star will break her silence on the Trump trust on 60 Minutes.