I just….?? She is awesome for all this, but can someone please explain to a foreigner how trump having an affair is a legal matter and what any of it has to do with his taxes? I can’t figure out what she is taking legal action about.
It’s not the actually affair she’s suing him over. From my understanding she is suing him over a nondisclosure agreement that shouldn’t be valid because trump didn’t actually sign it and she signed it under duress or threat or retaliation if she didn’t. Shes trying to get it deemed invalid
There are several issues involved that make it a legal matter, rather than a sex scandal:
>the above mentioned legality of the the NDA –> this is disputed and murky because of an argument as to whether or not Trump is legally the party in the agreement or an interested third party, supposedly, as the agreement technically is between Ciffords (Daniels’ legal name) and an LLC (limited liability company) seemingly created simply to pay her off while providing (not even) plausible deniability.
>Additionally, both sides point to violations of the contract–that Trump and his people would leave her and her family alone (she claims she was threatened in front of her child, but also suggests other violations), and they’re upset that she’s talking (which could cost her $1Million each instance) and that she has not destroyed all electronic communications and images related to the relationship.
>A little more complicated but more of an issue is the question of the $$. On the one hand she took it, implying a contractual agreement to abide by the terms. On the other hands, it was $130K paid days before the election to keep her from talking about a 10+ year old sex scandal. It strains credulity that it wasn’t about protecting Trump’s election chances. IF THAT IS THE CASE, it almost certainly violates campaign finance laws, especially since Trump’s personal lawyer cum attack dog, Michael Cohen, has claimed he paid it out of his pocket [house financing] out of friendship.
While he almost certainly did so to try to provide cover for Trump 1) it’s been a running joke that we all need friends and lawyers like these bc absolutely no one believes this and there’s reporting that Cohen was grousing that Trump hadn’t reimbursed him (surprise) and also was blowing up Trump’s phone around the time of the election, trying to get reimbursed, to no avail.
Basically, if it was Cohen, he and Trump violated campaign finance laws and if it was Trump, there are some other campaign finance reporting laws that I don’t really understand but which keep getting invoked that are an issue. But since Cohen is sticking to story 1, he sort of put Trump and himself into more jeopardy accidentally, is my understanding.
>Daniels has been very clear the sex was consensual and she was not a sexual assault survivor, and she doesn’t want her case to hurt the cases of sexual assault survivors.
To me, the issue with people on the left constantly gleefully emphasizing that Cliffords is a “porn star” is the way they use her (as she points out, legal) work to stand in for the tawdriness of Trump, his sexual predation, and corruption. Basically, it’s implied, we wouldn’t have this terrible dirty thing [Cliffords] in our political spotlight if it weren’t for Trump, and the “shame” of her work basically becomes a metaphor for Trump’s corruption and willingness to sell off important office to people who destroy the government function while personally profiting. In other words, He’s a political pimp and they’re all prostitutes whoring out the government, and she’s a perfect condensed figure to materialize all of the frustrated disgust at the corruption Trump openly facilitates and participates in.
The problem is, of course, that this logic is deeply infused with blatant puritanism and misogyny, leans on a presumed hatred and dehumanization of sex workers in particular and reinforces the treatment of them as social lepers, which is profoundly uncomfortable and under-examined.
The reality is that most of Trump’s followers don’t care about his sex scandals-they voted for him after the Access Hollywood tape. So basically beating up on sex workers in this way is not only horrible on its own account, it’s useless politically except as a sort of smug confirmation that Trump is an embarrassment, with sex workers as collateral damage.
>I listen to too many politics podcasts
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funeral-biscuit 