'Hush Money' Trial Explained | Why Is Trump On Trial?  | Are Hush Money Payments Illegal? | #shorts
Channel: Grift Guard
Date: 21/04/2024

Two women who said they had affairs with Trump years before he ran for president were paid six-figure sums in the months before the 2016 election.

The first woman, Karen McDougal, a Playboy model, was paid $150,000 by the National Enquirer's parent company, American Media Inc., for the rights to her story. AMI promptly did nothing with the story. It's a process known as "catch and kill."

AMI also paid to catch and kill a former Trump Tower doorman's story alleging Trump had an unacknowledged child, but that allegation has never been corroborated by any reporting. Trump's friend David Pecker, who was then CEO of AMI, OK'd the payments.

The second woman, who was born Stephanie Clifford but built a career in the adult-film industry as Stormy Daniels, was paid $130,000 by Trump's former fixer Michael Cohen to sign a nondisclosure agreement about her encounters with Trump. Cohen obtained a line of credit on his home to make the payment just before the election.

While a hush money payment is not necessarily illegal, Cohen and AMI have both admitted they broke laws by making these payments in an effort to hide unflattering information before the 2016 election.

Cohen pleaded guilty to two campaign finance charges in August 2018: causing an unlawful campaign contribution for his involvement orchestrating the payment from AMI to McDougal, and making an excessive campaign contribution for the payment to Daniels.

AMI, now known as a360media, was not criminally charged by federal authorities but did admit to making the payment to McDougal. The company paid a $187,500 fine to the Federal Election Commission for making an unlawful campaign contribution.

Cohen recorded at least one conversation with Trump that appears to be about the payment to Daniels in which they are heard discussing whether to make the payment in cash.