Washington Post national columnist Philip Bump prvided a fact-check on Monday in response to a tweet from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who referenced a common right-wing talking point concerning Donald Trump’s hush money trial involving Stormy Daniels.
Greene shared a January 2018 statement from Stormy Daniels in which she denied the alleged affair with Trump and accused Michael Cohen of perjury and lying. Greene used this statement to argue that the trial should not be taking place.
However, Bump pointed out that Daniels’s statement, which Trump himself has shared in recent weeks, is not as straightforward as it may seem. Bump argued that the statement is actually evidence that Trump had an affair with Daniels and that she had been silenced at the time by the payment she received from Cohen, who was later reimbursed by Trump.
“Again, this is the cover that the money Cohen gave Daniels (for which he was reimbursed by Trump) was paying for. This is evidence of the alleged crime, not exoneration.”
According to the Associated Press, the signed statement was released on January 30, 2018, but Daniels recanted it shortly after, admitting that an affair had occurred. She explained that her denials were due to a non-disclosure agreement and that she had signed the statement because she felt she had no choice.
Furthermore, the AP noted that Daniels first publicly discussed her affair with Trump in a 2011 interview with In Touch Weekly, where she detailed the affair and her interactions with Trump. The publication held off on releasing her story after Cohen threatened legal action, but it was eventually published in 2018.
“Missing context. The signed statement with the denial was publicly released on Jan. 30, 2018. Not long after, Daniels recanted the statement and said that an affair had occurred. She said her denials were due to a non-disclosure agreement and that she signed the statement because parties involved ‘made it sound like I had no choice,’”
