A lawyer for US President Donald Trump allegedly paid $130,000 to a porn star for not talking in public about a sexual relationship with the then Republic candidate in the weeks before the 2016 presidential election.
A report by Wall Street Journal said that the lawyer, Michael Cohen, allegedly paid Stephanie Clifford to not talk about a sexual encounter at Lake Tahoe, California, in 2006. This was a year after Trump had married his third wife, Melania, now the First Lady of the US.
The Journal said the payment was made to a client-trust account at City National Bank in Los Angeles.
Trump’s lawyer, however, denied the reports.
“These rumors have circulated time and again since 2011. President Trump once again vehemently denies any such occurrence, as has Ms. Daniels,” Cohen told The Washington Post.
In a statement that Cohen said was from the porn star, whose professional name is Stormy Daniels, it was said, “Rumors that I have received hush money from Donald Trump are completely false.”
The statement added, “If indeed I did have a relationship with Donald Trump, trust me, you wouldn’t be reading about it in the news, you would be reading about it in my book.”
In the final days of the US presidential race, Ms Clifford had reportedly discussed disclosing an alleged affair with Mr Trump with Good Morning America, reported London’s Evening Standard.
But she did not appear on the programme and a Trump campaign spokesperson at the time denied that the two had a sexual encounter.
