At 10:30 a.m. Tuesday in a New York City courtroom, five words changed American history: “People call me Stormy Daniels.”
Daniels is now a well-known adult film actor and a central figure in a hush-money criminal case that could send former president and current Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump to prison.
Manhattan prosecutors said Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 to keep quiet about their sexual relationship in the weeks before the 2016 election. Additionally, he allegedly listed his repayments to himself as legal expenses in business records.
But this morning, when Daniels entered Judge Juan Melchán’s courtroom dressed in black and matching eyeglass frames, her brassy hair cascading loosely upwards, her brassy hair cascaded loosely over the ledgers, checks, and bank records. The discourse faded into the background.
When she took her seat in the stands, Trump leaned back in his chair and turned toward her with a passive look on his face. Trump’s son Eric was in the front row of the gallery, behind his father, staring at the wall. President Trump’s lawyer Alina Haba, who is not involved in the case, sat with her arm crossed.
And so began the long-awaited courtroom showdown between Daniels and Trump. For several hours, Daniels produced a story for the tabloid, a mix of excitement and gossip, detailing an alleged encounter with Daniels nearly 20 years ago.
Daniels, who met Mr. Trump at a celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe, went to his hotel room, thinking that was exactly what his dinner invitation was about, until fate struck. He guided the jury through the night.
As Ms. Daniels was debating whether or not to participate, a colleague of hers told her: “That would make a great story.” “What could go wrong?”
As Daniel said, there are many answers.
They decided to talk a little before eating dinner, she recalled. President Trump repeatedly questioned Daniels about her work as an adult entertainer, peppering her with questions such as: Are you worried about sexually transmitted diseases? ” Had she been tested?
“Yes, of course. I volunteered,” she said. “He asked me, ‘Oh, have you ever done poorly on a test?’ And I said, ‘Oh, have you ever done poorly on a test?’ “No, let me show you all my records.”
At one point, Trump began showing Daniel photos, including one of Melania. Daniels told President Trump that she was “so beautiful.” The two reportedly slept in separate bedrooms.
They talked about President Trump’s reality show “The Apprentice.” Daniels said there was no way she could be on network television given her work in adult entertainment.
At this point, Trump appeared to be comparing Daniels to his daughter Ivanka.
“It reminds me of my daughter. She’s smart, she’s blonde, she’s beautiful, and people underestimate her,” Daniels recalled Trump saying.
The conversation got a little heated, so Daniels went through the bedroom to go to the bathroom. When she came out of the bathroom, she found Trump on the bed wearing boxer shorts and a T-shirt.
“At first I just had a jump scare,” Daniels told jurors. “I just thought, oh my gosh, what did I misread here? If someone is on the bed in their underwear, their intentions are obvious.”
As she tried to get out of the situation, Trump stood between her and the door, but she insisted he was “not threatening.”
“He said, I thought we were getting somewhere. I thought if you want to get out of that trailer park, you have to be serious about what you want.” ,” Daniels recalled Trump saying. “I was pissed because I had never lived in a trailer park.”
Daniels said they eventually had sex. Further details are sparse, but they include references to specific sexual positions and condoms, leading to a series of counterarguments from the defense. At one point during Daniels’ testimony, Trump shook his head.
President Trump’s chief lawyer, Todd Blanche, even called for a miscarriage of justice based on the extra evidence in comments. “We will move for a mistrial based on this morning’s testimony,” Blanche told Marchand after the lunch break. “In our view, there is no way to ring that bell.”
“Apart from pure embarrassment, these details only infuriated the jury,” Blanche said.
Marchand denied this request, but defense attorney Susan Necheres did her best to make Daniels seem like nothing more than a victim of circumstance. Necheres asked why Daniels decided to come forward with his story in 2016, so many years later.
“You tried to extort money from President Trump, right?”
“It’s false,” Daniels insisted.
“Well, that’s what you did, right?”
“Wrong!” Daniels said her defiant demeanor during cross-examination contrasted with the nervous discomfort she had appeared earlier.
Her cross-examination is scheduled to continue on Thursday.
Hugo Lowell contributed reporting to this article
