After former President Donald Trump launched into a diatribe about being under investigation for giving her hush money to stay quiet about their previous sexual encounter, adult film star Stormy Daniels celebrated with a victory lap on Tuesday.
Earlier in the day, Trump characterized his interactions with Daniels as “VERY OLD and happened a long time ago” in a post on his Truth Social account.
Then, Trump went on to accuse former “fixer” Michael Cohen, who was sentenced to prison after pleading guilty to aiding in the facilitation of an unlawful campaign donation in the form of payments to Daniels, of having something to do with his decision to pay off Daniels.
“I placed full Reliance on the JUDGEMENT AND ADVICE OF COUNCIL (sic), who I had every reason to believe had a license to practice law, was competent, and was able to appropriately provide solid legal services,” Trump wrote of Cohen.
In response to Trump’s remarks, Daniels made fun of him for appearing to accept the veracity of her claims that he gave her hush money during the 2016 presidential campaign.
“Thanks for just admitting that I was telling the truth about EVERYTHING,” she wrote. “Guess I’ll take my ‘horse face’ back to bed now, Mr. former ‘president’. Btw, that’s the correct way to use quotation marks.”
Trump infamously referred to Daniels as “horse face” when her charges against him became public, to which Daniels responded by ridiculing the size and shape of Trump’s genitalia.
The New York Times says that the New York district attorney’s office started presenting evidence to a grand jury this week regarding whether Trump broke the law by paying Stormy Daniels $130,000 in hush money.
Weeks before the presidential election, in October 2016, adult film star Stormy Daniels was preparing to come forward with her own account of a consensual sexual encounter she had with Trump in 2006. At the time, Trump was being publicly harassed by a series of sexual harassment or assault accusations from many different women. She would, however, be open to receiving payment in exchange for her quiet, according to her representatives.
Earlier in the campaign, Cohen collaborated with American Media Inc., the National Enquirer’s parent company, to “catch and kill” damaging reports about Trump. In this strategy, AMI would pay accusers for the exclusive rights to their story before declining to publish it. Daniels’ compensation was discussed with AMI executives as well, but they ultimately objected, forcing Cohen to handle the situation on his own.
On October 27, Cohen established a fictitious business called Essential Consultants and transferred $130,000 to Daniels’s attorney. Later, after he had won the election, Trump reimbursed Cohen in 2017.
Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York later claimed that this was illegal because it broke campaign finance laws. They claimed that because this money was used to assist Trump in winning the election, it should have been reported as campaign spending and subject to the donation restrictions set forth by law. The case was never put to a jury because Cohen admitted guilt to this charge as part of a larger plea agreement.
However, as Trump prepared to leave office in 2021, SDNY prosecutors reviewed the case and debated whether to pursue it once he lost presidential immunity. Prosecutors differed on the strength of the case, according to the most current book Untouchable by CNN legal commentator Elie Honig.
“Some believed the evidence was more than enough to charge in an ordinary case, while others thought it was still a close call, though still chargeable,” Honig writes, continuing, “Even if the evidence was sufficient to support a charge, it also wasn’t a slam-dunk case in the majority view.”
According to the New York Times, the issue is reportedly back in the news because prosecutors have an idea for a charge. The crucial factor is that when Trump reimbursed Cohen for the hush money, he declared it to be legal expenses. According to the prosecution, such amounted to illegally falsifying business records.
However, they also want to claim that this was done in violation of New York state election law, which makes it a felony, since it would only be a misdemeanor and scarcely be worth charging for. The Times reporters write, “That second aspect has largely gone untested, and would therefore make for a risky legal case against any defendant, let alone the former president.”
