Ex-publisher testifies about Trump scheme
NEW YORK — As Donald Trump was running for president in 2016, his old friend at the National Enquirer was scooping up potentially damaging stories about the candidate and paying out tens of thousands of dollars to keep them from the public eye.
But when it came to the seamy claims by porn performer Stormy Daniels, David Pecker said he put his foot down.
“I am not paying for this story,” he told jurors Thursday at Trump’s hush money trial, recounting his version of a conversation with Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen about the catch-and-kill scheme that prosecutors alleged amounted to interference in the race. Pecker was already $180,000 in the hole on other Trump-related stories by the time Daniels came along. “I didn’t want to be involved in this from the beginning.”
Pecker’s testimony was a critical building block for the prosecution’s theory that their partnership was a way to illegally influence the 2016 presidential election.
Trump had asked to skip his New York criminal proceedings for the day so he could sit in on the Supreme Court’s special session, but that request was denied by Judge Juan M. Merchan, who is overseeing Trump’s trial on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in connection with the hush money payments, which involved buying the rights to someone’s story but never publishing it.
Trump has maintained he is not guilty of any of the charges. In New York, he says the stories that were bought and squelched were false.
“There is no case here. This is just a political witch hunt,” he said before court in brief comments to reporters.
As Pecker testified in a calm, cooperative tone about risque tales and secret dealings, the atmosphere in the utilitarian 1940s courtroom was one of quiet attentiveness.
Pecker recalled that the publication bought a sordid tale from a New York City doorman and purchased accusations of an extramarital affair with former Playboy model Karen McDougal to prevent the claims from getting out.
There was some talk of reimbursement from Trump’s orbit, but Pecker was ultimately never paid.
The breaking point for Pecker came with Daniels, who was eventually paid by Cohen to keep quiet over her claim of a 2006 sexual encounter with Trump. The ex-president denies it happened.
Pecker recalled to the jury that he was dining with his wife the night after the public learned of the infamous 2005 “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump discussed grabbing women sexually without permission, when then-editor Dylan Howard called with an urgent matter.
Howard said he heard from Daniels’ representatives that she was trying to sell her story and that the tabloid could acquire it for $120,000, Pecker told jurors. Pecker was tapped out; he told Cohen as much.
At the same time, Pecker advised that someone — just not he — should do something to prevent the story from going public.
“I said to Michael, ‘My suggestion to you is that you should buy the story, and you should take it off the market because if you don’t and it gets out, I believe the boss will be very angry with you.’”
Cohen followed his advice. Prosecutors finished their questioning Thursday, and Trump defense attorney Emil Bove opened his cross-examination by grilling Pecker on his recollection of specific dates and meetings, an apparent effort to underscore the difficulty of recalling details relevant to the years-old allegations.
In other developments, prosecutors argued Trump again violated a gag order, all while waiting to hear whether he would be held in contempt on other suspected violations.