Daniels’ lawyer not sure about taking on Trump

WASHINGTON: Michael Avenatti, the veteran trial attorney, who has frequently spoken to the media as the lawyer for Stormy Daniels, says he has yet to decide if he will run to unseat president Donald Trump in 2020.

Avenatti is emphatic about one thing. He is not on “a listening tour,” he told The Washington Post by phone on Saturday, because that’s something politicians say.

“[Avenatti]’s got a fearlessness,” Steve Bannon, the Republican strategist and former senior White House adviser, told Bill Maher on Friday night on HBO.

But whoever the Democrats name as their nominee, he said, needs to be a “ighter.” He is one, he said, and could be a serious threat to a second Trump term.

“And he’s a ighter. I think he’ll go through a lot of that ield, if he decides to stick with it, like a scythe through grass.”

It is a new age, Bannon explained, where politicians ascending from Congress or the governor’s ofice may not be the clearest path to the White House.

Maher agreed. “[Avenatti] could be the Trump of 2020, the guy who’s the outsider, who blows through the regular politician because he looks different,” he said.

“They recognise perhaps they have a problem on their hands, and I happen to agree with them,” Avenatti said of Republicans. “If I decide to do this, I’m going to surprise a lot of people.”

Avenatti, a ierce critic of Trump, takes the comparison as a compliment. Mostly.

He speaks directly. He’s not afraid to be confrontational. He has success in a ield other than politics.

In a crowded ield, he said he can distinguish himself by the form of someone who has never bent under the will of a straw poll or focus group. It sounds like a formula that helped propel Trump to ofice.