Trump’s lawyer confirms $130G payment to Stormy Daniels

Trump’s longtime lawyer Michael Cohen confirmed he made the $130,000 payment out to Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 elections.  (RICHARD DREW/AP)

President Trump's personal lawyer said that he paid porn star Stormy Daniels $130,000 in hush money out of his own pocket claiming no one in the President’s camp was involved.

“Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with (Stormy Daniels), and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly,” attorney Michael Cohen said.

Despite the claim that he acted independently of the President, good government group Common Cause contends the payoff still violates federal election law.

The X-rated film star, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, claimed that she had sex with the President in 2006 after meeting him at a celebrity golf tournament, In Touch magazine reported.

Daniels, who first starred in “Big Breasted Goddesses of Las Vegas” and made a cameo in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” told In Touch weekly in an interview that “the sex was nothing crazy.”

Trump was married to First Lady Melania Trump at the time.

Stormy Daniels claimed she had an affair with Trump in 2006, just months after his wife Melania Trump gave birth to son Barron. (ETHAN MILLER/GETTY IMAGES)

A lawyer for Daniels negotiated the payoff a month before the 2016 election in exchange for silence about the affair, according to the Wall Street Journal.

News of the tryst broke, however, in the Journal in January, which reported that Cohen brokered the nondisclosure agreement.

He vehemently denied the payment and the affair at the time.

After the report, Common Cause filed complaints with the Federal Election Commission and the Department of Justice alleging that the money constituted an illegal in-kind contribution because it was designed to influence the election and exceeded the $2,700 donation limit. The group also claimed that the presidential campaign had skirted disclosure laws.

On Tuesday, in response to the group’s claim, Cohen admitted that he paid Daniels, but stressed that he had done nothing wrong.

Cohen, who previously denied reports of the payment as “completely false,”did not elaborate on whether Trump was aware of the payment. (MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

“The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful, and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone,” he said Tuesday.

Cohen, who has been Trump’s lawyer since 2007, did not elaborate on the details of the payment and whether Trump was made aware of it.

Regardless of the lawyer’s contention, Paul Ryan, an attorney for Common Cause, said Cohen’s admission doesn’t clear him of wrongdoing.

“When a President’s own lawyer is trying to influence the campaign, he’s not acting independently,” he said.

- ny news