Defense says #StormyDaniels was in conversation w/multiple reporters about the possibility of selling her story before the election, seeking to use that info to show that Daniels was using her story to threaten #Trump.
Defense, as it did w/ #KeithDavidson, Daniels's fmr lawyer, is trying to paint Daniels as not only a liar, but as an extortionist, saying that she was telling Weisberg, that she either wanted money or she wanted to hurt Trump politically.
#Necheles: “You were threatening to try to hurt [Trump] if he didn’t give you money.”
#StormyDaniels: “False”
On Tues, Daniels said that she spoke w/ Slate reporter Jacob Weisberg during a period when her deal w/ #MichaelCohen seemed like it would not go through. Today, she made a similar but finer point, saying the interview w/ Weisberg was almost like an insurance policy to make certain her story would get out if the NDA collapsed.
#StormyDaniels is pushing back on #Necheles, asking for evidence when the lawyer claims that Daniels had called her lawyer weak-willed.
Daniels: “Show me where I said that,” - forcing the defense to produce exhibits to back up allegations.
Necheles pulls up the transcript & audio & Daniels’s voice is not on the tape; it is #MichaelCohen & #KeithDavidson, her lawyer at the time - so Daniels is correct, not the #Trump atty.
The jurors heard an audio recording of #KeithDavidson, #StormyDaniels’s fmr lawyer, telling #MichaelCohen that she was desperate for the money & was panicked that her leverage to get it would disappear after the 2016 election because she expected #Trump to lose. Davidson describes hearing Daniels say this to him on the phone, but Daniels denied it to the court shortly after the tape was played.
Defense’s goal seems to be to establish that she was motivated by money.
#StormyDaniels is not on trial.
Her truthfulness about her motives may go to credibility, but it’s #Trump’s motives in seeking to silence her story are what matters re the charges, not her truthfulness.
Remember, Trump paid off the doorman & everyone knew that story was a fiction.
Whether her story is true or not is irrelevant.
What’s at issue is whether Trump falsified business records to hide paying her off to keep a damaging story from the public prior to the election.
