Washington:
In July 2006, real estate mogul and reality TV star Donald Trump and X-rated movie actress Stormy Daniels both attended a celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe.
This point is not controversial.
Trump was competing (he finished 62nd out of 80 contestants), while Daniels was working as a “greeter” at the booth of porn studio “Wicked Pictures.”
They posed for photos together – Trump in a red Trump National Golf Club hat and yellow polo shirt, Daniels in a black crop top.
Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, said Trump invited her to his hotel penthouse suite for sex.
Trump says that never happened.
Fast forward to April 2024, and Trump and Daniels, who are seeking to re-enter the White House in November, are preparing to meet again – in a Manhattan courtroom for the first criminal trial of a former US president.
These are the events that led to politically explosive cases:
Lake Tahoe
Daniels recounted her fateful encounter with Trump at a Nevada golf resort in her 2018 tell-all book “Full Disclosure” and in the new Peacock Channel documentary “The Tempest.”
Daniels was 27 and Trump was 60 at the time. His third wife, Melania, gave birth to their son, Barron, about four months ago.
Daniels said one of Trump’s bodyguards invited her to dinner with the “Apprentice” star in his hotel room.
In the interview for the documentary, Daniels said they had a “good conversation” that was “not sexual at all” and that Trump showed a particular interest in the business side of the porn industry.
“He told me I reminded him of his daughter,” she said. “I thought we had this mutual respect.
“That’s why when I walked out of the bathroom and found myself cornered — there were no red flags in the conversation — it was so crazy.
“It sucked, but I didn’t say no,” she said. “I didn’t want it to happen, but I allowed it to happen.”
Daniels said she remained in contact with Trump over the next year, hoping he would make good on his promise to have her on his TV show “Celebrity Apprentice.”
But that never came to fruition, and Daniels said she eventually stopped taking his calls.
Contact magazine
In Touch contacted Daniels about the Lake Tahoe incident in 2011, when Trump was considering a run for the White House against Democrat Barack Obama.
Daniels took a polygraph test, which she said she passed, and was paid $15,000.
The story never circulated and was suppressed by Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, who goes by the nickname “Pitbull.”
Shortly afterwards, Daniels said, she was threatened in a parking lot by a man who warned her to “stay off Trump.”
“Hush fee” payment
The Lake Tahoe story resurfaced in the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign, when Trump was the Republican nominee and already facing criticism for his vulgar remarks about women in an “Access Hollywood” tape.
The National Enquirer, a tabloid owned by a Trump ally, discovered that Daniels was seeking bidders for a potentially damaging story about her tryst with Trump.
The tabloid put her in touch with Cohen.
Cohen, who has since turned against Trump, admitted that he paid Daniels $130,000 in “hush money” in exchange for her silence about the 2006 encounter.
Daniels and Trump signed nondisclosure agreements prepared by Cohen under the pseudonyms Peggy Peterson and David Dennison.
Trump repaid Cohen $130,000 as he faces 34 counts of falsifying business records as part of a scheme to “illegally influence the 2016 presidential election.”
Trump has denied any wrongdoing and claimed he was the victim of a political “witch hunt” by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a campaign by Democrats aimed at derailing his 2024 White House campaign.
Cohen and Daniels, who are in prison for tax evasion and campaign finance violations, are expected to testify in Trump’s trial, where jury selection begins on Monday.
Notoriety
Since coming out, Daniels has used her fame to make appearances at strip clubs across the country on a “Make America Horny Again” tour.
But she also faced death threats, fears for her daughter’s safety, the breakdown of her marriage, mounting legal bills and betrayal by her own lawyer.
Daniels’ attorney, Michael Avenatti, deceived the literary agent into transferring $300,000 of the $800,000 advance she received for her book into a bank account he controlled.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
