‘You wanted to make more money, didn’t you?’: Donald Trump’s defense tried to discredit adult film star Stormy Daniels on Thursday in a tense second day of crucial testimony at the trial to the former American president from New York, writes the AFP agency, quoted by boursorama.com.
Already under questioning for five hours on Tuesday, the actress and director spoke candidly about the meeting and sexual relationship she claims she had with the current Republican presidential candidate in 2006 on the sidelines of a celebrity golf tournament in Nevada.
A sexual relationship that Donald Trump denies, but which is at the heart of the business, because precisely to keep silent about this episode, ten years later, the actress received $130,000 from Donald Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, under a duly signed confidentiality agreement.
The former US president, the first in history to appear before a criminal court, is on trial for hiding the repayment of sums to his lawyer in the accounts of his holding company, the Trump Organization. He is on trial on 34 counts of falsifying accounts, which could lead to a conviction and, in theory, jail time.
When Donald Trump, 77, arrived in court Thursday, he denounced a “Frankenstein” case that “nobody understands.”
“Protecting my story”
Then, inside the dated-looking courtroom with old-fashioned wooden furniture and white neon chandeliers, one of her attorneys, Susan Necheles, continued her cross-examination that began Tuesday, trying to portray Stormy Daniels as a woman thirsty for money.
“You wanted to make more money, didn’t you?”, the lawyer repeated, about why she negotiated a non-disclosure agreement with Donald Trump.
“Were you threatening to do political harm to President Trump if he didn’t give you money for this story?” she insisted.
“I chose safety,” Stormy Daniels replied. “The best solution was to protect my story with a written trail, so that my family would not be in danger,” she added.
The lawyer pointed out Tuesday that Stormy Daniels still owes the former president $600,000 in legal fees from a defamation lawsuit she lost against him, and said she has every interest in seeing him convicted.
Since April 15, Donald Trump has been forced to sit in a Manhattan courtroom almost every day and listen in silence to the debates, an obligation that prevents him from campaigning as he pleases.
“Unbalanced balance of power”
On Tuesday, Stormy Daniels made no bones about her 2006 tryst with the real estate mogul: from the “silk or satin pajamas” she wore in his hotel suite to the confidences about his wife — “we don’t sleep in the same room” — and up to the fact that he didn’t use a condom.
Stormy Daniels described her reaction when she emerged from the bathroom to find the 60-year-old billionaire waiting for her naked on his bed. “I felt the blood leave my hands,” she said. Although she did not feel threatened, she insists that the businessman’s intention “was quite clear” and that “the balance of power was unbalanced.”
The defense condemned the presentation as “extremely damaging” to the Republican candidate, six months before his new duel with Joe Biden on November 5.
Judge Juan Merchan agreed that certain passages of the testimony could have been “left unsaid.”
In a sign of the tension that reigned, he also asked Donald Trump’s lawyers to control their client, who “sweared” during Stormy Daniels’ account, from any reaction that might “intimidate the witness”.
Although the consequences of a possible conviction on his campaign are difficult to predict, an acquittal of Donald Trump would represent a victory for him.
Especially since the trial in New York will likely be the only one of the four criminal cases in which he is accused that will be tried before the November 5 election.
