President Trump was reportedly involved in an effort earlier this year to keep adult-film star Stormy Daniels from talking publicly about her alleged affair with the president, according to a Wall Sreet Journal report.
The Journal, citing people familiar with the events, reported on Tuesday that in February Trump told his then-lawyer Michael Cohen to seek a restraining order against Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, through a confidential arbitration proceeding.
The reported phone call came shortly after Trump and Cohen had learned of Daniels’s intention to give an interview despite her 2016 nondisclosure agreement.
{mosads}The Journal notes that Trump asked Cohen to coordinate this response with his son, Eric Trump, and an outside lawyer, Lawrence Rosen, who has represented Trump and the Trump Organization in a number of cases.
Trump also communicated that he would pay the legal costs for this response, according to the report.
Rosen later asked Jill Martin, a Trump Organization lawyer, to sign off on arbitration documents — a request that Rosen said came from Eric Trump, according to the Journal.
The White House directed the Journal to the president’s outside counsel when reached for comment.
One of Trump’s lawyers, Jay Sekulow, declined to comment for the new report. The Trump Organization also declined to comment.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Hill.
The report indicates that Trump was personally involved in an effort to keep Clifford from coming out publicly and detailing her alleged sexual affair with Trump.
An arbitrator reportedly issued a restraining order privately, according to the report, but Clifford apparently ignored it and proceeded with an interview with Anderson Cooper for CBS’s “60 minutes.”
Clifford claims she had an affair with the president more than a decade ago and is currently suing him and Cohen over the nondisclosure agreement meant to keep her quiet.
She claims that the deal is void because the president did not sign the document. Clifford is also suing Trump for defamation.
In August, Cohen pleaded guilty to several federal charges, including violating campaign finance laws. Cohen says he violated campaign finance law at Trump’s instruction with the $130,000 nondisclosure payment to Clifford.
Clifford’s attorney, Michael Avenatti, on Tuesday said the new report “describes what we have been saying for months and what Trump and Cohen denied repeatedly.”
“In the same way Trump is now attacking Julie Swetnick. He is a thug and a liar,” Avenatti added, referring to another client of his, a woman who has accused Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct.