MANHATTAN (CN) — Stormy Daniels returned to a New York City court on Thursday to ward off arguments from Donald Trump’s lawyers that she was a vindictive opportunist willing to lie to make a quick buck or hurt Trump’s image.
The former porn star’s presence brought even more buzz than usual to the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse, the stage for Trump’s ongoing criminal trial. Seated in the completely full courtroom on Thursday was U.S. Senator Rick Scott, seemingly as a show of support from one of Trump’s Republican allies.
On the witness stand for a second straight trial day was Daniels, who was attacked by Trump’s attorneys for her past as an exotic dancer and adult film actress. Daniels on Tuesday claimed that she had a meeting with Trump in 2006 that resulted in the two having “brief” sex.
Defense attorneys used Daniels’ career in an attempt to poke holes in that story.
“You have a lot of experience making phony stories about sex appear to be real, correct?” asked Susan Necheles, one of Trump’s lawyers.
“That’s not how I would put it,” Daniels replied, later adding, “The sex in those films is very real, just like what happened in that room.”
Trump stared forward, eyebrows furrowed.
Daniels previously testified that during her 2006 meeting with Trump, she was surprised to emerge from the bathroom of his hotel room to find that he had stripped down to his underwear and was laying in bed. Daniels said that she never had intended to have sex with him that day, and that the incident left her shocked and disoriented.
“At first, I was just startled, like a jump scare,” she said Tuesday. “I wasn’t expecting someone to be there, especially minus a lot of clothing. That’s when I had that moment where I felt the room spin in slow motion.”
Necheles on Thursday asked Daniels why she was so surprised at the incident, considering she’s seen plenty of naked men doing porn and it was “not the first time” someone had made a pass at her.
“You were so upset that he wanted to have sex with you that you couldn't speak up?” Necheles asked.
Daniels said that Trump was “twice my age and bigger than me,” but reiterated that she never claimed to be threatened by Trump. She said that she had sex with him because of “my own insecurities.”
“I maintained that he did not put his hands on me,” she said. “I have said that and I maintain that I was not physically threatened or drugged.”
Necheles continued to interrogate Daniels on claims that she was merely looking to get paid by fabricating a story to sell to the media. She added that Daniels was looking to hurt Trump’s campaign because of his “opposition to abortion and gay marriage.” Daniels denied that, holding firm that her story about Trump was true and not a cash grab.
“If that story was untrue I’d have written it to be a lot better,” Daniels said,
Throughout Daniels’ testimony on Thursday, the former president alternated between blankly leaning back with his eyes shut, and hunching forward with a focused glare. Earlier this week, Trump was muttering and visibly reacting as Daniels spoke, an incident that the judge addressed to Trump’s lawyers during a private sidebar.
“I understand that your client is upset at this point, but he is cursing audibly, and he is shaking his head visually and that’s contemptuous,” New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan said Tuesday, according to court transcripts. “It has the potential to intimidate the witness and the jury can see that.”
Prosecutors claim that Trump orchestrated a hush-money payment to Daniels to keep her from telling her story during the 2016 presidential election, then falsified business records to cover it up.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg claims the incident was part of a broader scheme from Trump to quash negative press during his campaign. He indicted Trump last year on 34 counts of falsifying business records, to which Trump pleaded not guilty.
Read daily transcripts of the Trump hush-money criminal trial here. Note there is a delay of several days before new transcripts are posted.
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