Adult film star Stormy Daniels reportedly believes recent comments by President Trump’s lawyer open the way for her to discuss publicly her alleged affair with Trump.
A manager for Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that Daniels believes Michael Cohen, the president’s personal lawyer, violated a 2016 nondisclosure agreement by telling The New York Times that he personally paid her to stay quiet about the 2006 affair.
The Wall Street Journal reported last month that Cohen arranged a $130,000 payment to Daniels shortly before the 2016 election in exchange for her silence on the alleged affair.
{mosads}Soon after the Wall Street Journal story, InTouch magazine ran a previously unpublished 2011 interview with Daniels in which she detailed her Trump interactions, which allegedly occurred shortly after the birth of Donald and Melania Trump’s son, Barron.
Cohen said Tuesday that he paid the $130,000 out of his own pocket. His comments were an effort to quell accusations that the Trump campaign had paid Daniels. A nonprofit watchdog group filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission earlier this year claiming the payment violated campaign finance law.
“Neither 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,” Cohen said in a statement to the Times. “The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful, and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone.”
Though she reportedly spoke openly about the alleged affair in past years and in her interview with InTouch, Daniels has sidestepped questions about it in recent weeks.