Back in January, the world heard allegations that Trump had bedded a porn star and paid for her silence while married to Melania.
Stormy Daniels has not been able to discuss the Trump affair because of the non-disclosure agreement. That, however, may change.
Because the porn actress and director is suing Donald Trump and saying that the contract is void.
We"ve all heard very weird details about Donald Trump, thanks to an old interview that predated the "hush agreement."
Namely, that he"s allegedly very afraid of sharks but would watch hours of Shark Week, though this was back when Shark Week was good and before they decided to air fake specials about hypothetical creatures for ratings.
Also, he allegedly had her spank him with a rolled up Forbes magazine. There"s an image that no one ever wanted.
Though Stormy Daniels has been interviewed and asked directly about these accusations, she hasn"t been able to confirm or deny anything thanks to the alleged non-disclosure agreement.
That NDA was accompanied by $ 130,000 and came just weeks before the 2016 election.
Now, however, Stormy is suing Trump. Will she be able to reveal everything?
CNN reports on the contents of the legal complaint that Stormy Daniels — real name Stephanie Clifford — has filed.
One big issue that her team believes invalidates the agreement is that Trump never signed it.
"Despite Mr. Trump"s failure to sign the Hush Agreement, Mr. Cohen proceeded to cause $ 130,000.00 to be wired to the trust account of Ms. Clifford"s attorney."
Her lawyer says that, without the signatures of both parties, the document is just a piece of paper with ink on it.
"He did so even though there was no legal agreement and thus no written nondisclosure agreement whereby Ms. Clifford was restricted from disclosing the truth about Mr. Trump."
Ms. Daniels" legal complaint goes on to imply that there have been attempts to force her out of the spotlight.
"To be clear, the attempts to intimidate Ms. Clifford into silence and "shut her up" in order to "protect Mr. Trump" continue unabated."
That doesn"t seem to be an empty claim — as the complaint lists an example.
"For example, only days ago on or about February 27, 2018, Mr. Trump"s attorney Mr. Cohen surreptitiously initiated a bogus arbitration proceeding against Ms. Clifford in Los Angeles."
Yikes.
"Remarkably, he did so without even providing Ms. Clifford with notice of the proceeding and basic due process."
It looks like Stormy"s lawsuit has multiple goals, and that one of them is to stop this alleged harassment.
To hear Cohen tell it, he just woke up one morning and decided to create an LLC and wire $ 130,000 to Ms. Daniels.
"Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly."
While there are plenty of ways to reward or compensate someone without a direct reimbursement, it"s admittedly very funny to imagine a man just deciding to send her, like, half a house"s worth of money for no reason.
Especially since this was a short time before that fateful, dreadful 2016 election.
Cohen"s statement was interpreted by many as a hollow attempt to cover for Trump.
But Cohen"s statement is coming back to bite him.
Ms. Daniels" lawsuit mentions that Cohen issued that denial "without any consent by Ms. Clifford, thus evidencing Mr. Cohen"s apparent position (at least in that context) that no binding agreement was in place."
So that makes two reasons for which she may be free to tell all.
CNN reports that perhaps Trump didn"t sign so that he would later be able to deny that the agreement — and affair — ever took place.
But some wonder if perhaps he didn"t sign it because the $ 1 million penalty for divulging that the affair took place applies to both of them.
Perhaps he has enough self-awareness to realize that he sometimes just runs his mouth and boasts and might have shared it. Remember, this is a guy whose own lawyers are afraid that he"ll perjure himself if he"s placed under oath.
While no one really envies Stormy Daniels" alleged experience of "generic" sex with Donald Trump, a lot of people want for her to be free to speak up about it.
In part because a lot of NDAs are creepy and the idea of silencing a woman about her own sexual experiences is, well, a source of discomfort.
Mostly, however, because of Agent Orange"s administration, many Americans are getting through the day through schadenfreude and spite, and the idea of embarrassing Trump would bring a small measure of satisfaction to many.
But … realistically, in and of itself, this scandal is like a footnote. The Trump administration has a new scandal every day, it seems, with departures from the White House and multiple criminal investigations.
There is one very important detail, which CNN notes:
If these allegations in Stormy"s lawsuit are true, it would reportedly be a violation of federal election laws.
