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President Donald Trump said that campaign money "played no roll" in monthly reimbursements paid to his former lawyer Michael Cohen, who paid $130,000 to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016 to stay quiet about an alleged affair.
The President admitted that Cohen received a "monthly retainer," but said that it had "nothing to do with the campaign" in a series of Tweets on Thursday. Trump has previously denied knowing anything about the payment.
His announcement comes after his new lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, revealed that Trump agreed to pay Cohen $35,000 a month “out of his personal funds” over the course of a year-long period that began in the first few months of 2017.
“It clearly was a payment to reimburse expenses,” Giuliani told BuzzFeed News, after making the explosive announcement in an interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News Wednesday night — adding the caveat, “I’m almost certain that there wasn’t an itemized bill.”
The president went on to explain that Cohen entered into a non-disclosure agreement with Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, which he said was "very common among celebrities and people of wealth."
He said the agreement was used to stop Daniels from making "false and extortionist" claims about an alleged affair.
In 2016, Daniels signed a settlement agreement requiring her not to talk about the relationship. She has filed a lawsuit against Trump and Cohen in an effort to have it tossed out — in part because Trump did not sign it.
A federal judge put her case on hold last week for at least 90 days due to the ongoing criminal investigation into Cohen.
Trump said that Daniels had signed a "detailed letter admitting there was no affair."
from BuzzFeed - USNews https://ift.tt/2rnIU31
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