Adult film star Stormy Daniels has filed a civil suit against President Donald Trump in an effort to void a nondisclosure agreement between the two.
Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, claims in her suit filed Tuesday that the nondisclosure agreement is not valid because Trump never signed the deal, according to documents revealed publicly by her attorney, Michael Avenatti.
Daniels and Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, both signed the agreement days before the 2016 presidential election, according to the suit.
“To be clear, the attempts to intimidate Ms. Clifford into silence and ‘shut her up’ in order to ‘protect Mr. Trump’ continue unabated,” the suit says. “On or about February 27, 2018, Mr. Trump’s attorney Mr. Cohen surreptitiously initiated a bogus arbitration proceeding against Ms. Clifford in Los Angeles.”
The lawsuit also claims Daniels and Trump engaged in an intimate relationship that lasted from summer 2006 “well into the year 2007.”
Cohen acknowledged last month that he paid Daniels $130,000 in October 2016 as part of the agreement that ensured she would not speak about an alleged 2006 sexual encounter with Trump.
Cohen said that he made the payment out of his own pocket and denied that it violated campaign finance laws.
The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that Cohen was unable to locate Trump prior to making the payment, and as a result had to wire the funds himself. Despite the alleged payment being made, Cohen and a White House official have denied the affair ever took place.
Daniels gave a detailed account on her encounter with Trump in a 2011 interview, but has not commented on it publicly since Cohen’s payment was first reported.
A manager for Daniels said last month that the actress believed that Cohen’s acknowledgement of the payment have broken the nondisclosure agreement, leaving her free to talk about the affair.
