https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/stormy-daniels-sue-trump_us_5a9f3867e4b002df2c5ea659
Sarah Ruiz-Grossman reports for HuffPost:
Stephanie Clifford (aka Stormy Daniels), who claims she had an affair with Donald Trump, is now suing the president.
According to a lawsuit Clifford filed in Los Angeles on Tuesday, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, Trump didn’t sign a nondisclosure agreement with the former adult film star, which blocked her from disclosing their 2006 relationship. According to the suit, Clifford and Trump’s lawyer signed the document, but Trump did not, allegedly making the agreement invalid.
Clifford and Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen both signed what the suit calls a “hush agreement” and a side letter agreement on Oct. 28, 2016, just 11 days before the presidential election. The documents are appended to the lawsuit, according to NBC.
The 2016 “hush agreement” detailed that $130,000 would be paid to Clifford’s then-attorney in exchange for Clifford not disclosing any confidential information about Trump or his sexual partners. The suit claims Clifford and Trump’s intimate relationship started in the summer of 2006 and went “well into the year 2007.”
Clifford’s attoreny, Michael Avenatti, released a copy of the complaint for declaratory relief on Twitter on Tuesday.
In January, The Wall Street Journal reported that Clifford had an affair with Trump in 2006, the year after he married Melania Knauss on Jan. 22, 2005, and a few months after their son, Barron, was born on March 20. The report said Clifford was paid $130,000 to sign a nondisclosure agreement and not discuss the relationship. At the time, Clifford’s lawyer released a statement from the actress denying the affair.
In the lawsuit, Clifford claims that Cohen had tried to block her from talking about the affair as recently as Feb. 27, according to NBC. The suit also claims that in January, Cohen, “concerned the truth would be disclosed … through intimidation and coercive tactics, forced Ms. Clifford into signing a false statement wherein she stated that reports of her relationship with Mr. Trump were false.”
After Cohen told The New York Times last month that he had in fact paid Clifford $130,000 in 2016, Clifford said she was free “to tell her story” because Cohen’s discussion of the agreement invalidated it. Cohen at the time did not say what the payment was for and said that neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign reimbursed him for the payment.
Attorney Avenatti told HuffPost late Tuesday: “We confirm all facts as alleged in the complaint.”
HuffPost also reached out to the White House and Cohen for comment but did not receive a response as of this posting.
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No dull moments in the White House of Sleaze. But, the Trump Administration has so many violations of law and ethics in play every day that most of them more or less sink “below the radar screen.” Still, the “Stormster” doesn’t seem to be going quietly into the night.
PWS
03-07-18