Stormy Daniels’ attorney, Michael Avenatti, called out the President and his former lawyer Michael Cohen over their move to drop the $130,000 hush agreement with Daniels in recent days.
According to a court filing reviewed by Bloomberg, both Trump and Cohen filed paperwork in court claiming they wouldn’t enforce the details of a non-disclosure agreement established with Daniels in October 2016. They reportedly also requested that Daniels return the $130,000 that bought her silence.
Avenatti — who is also publicly mulling a run for president in 2020 after he saw his public profile skyrocket in recent months while representing Daniels, an adult film star — attacked Trump and Cohen for threatening Daniels with a $20 million damages if she spoke about the affair.
“These threats were all premised on a giant lie,” Avenatti said in the filing in a fedearl Los Angeles court, according to Bloomberg. “If they are now to be believed, Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen never had a good faith basis to assert that they would be able to enforce the settlement agreement.”
Sjpanky didn’t pay her off, well maybe Cohen did it without his permission, well, he knew about it and now he wants it back. This is all about Spanky’s lawyers fear of him making a deposition. I don’t understand the legal issues but I hope Avenatti keeps the heat on. However, I do have to wonder at some point whether he is doing it to keep his name in the news or for the benefit of his client.
Clearly, then, the $130K was a payoff in exchange for silence.
We’ve come a long way from the days of “There was no payoff”.
Avenatti is a better chess player than trump’s lawyers. Because he’s got them in a position where (if I read the remarks correctly) they either have to admitt to having committed fraud from the beginning or to having attempted to commit extortion during the “enforcement” phase of the operation. And both of those can be state crimes.
Is Stormy free to talk now?
Says Avenatti. Still on the table are the claims of defamation, attorneys’ fees, claims of Cohen and the other attorney conspiring to cheat Daniels out of proper legal counsel, and with regards to Trump, setting the whole NDA up in a way to violate campaign finance laws. Cohen’s already pled guilty to that last item, but Trump hasn’t. Avenatti is bound and determined to get his depositions and day in court. Go, Avenatti!