'Stormy was his mistress': The text messages from the porn star's publicist ... trends now
Donald Trump threatened to put a celebrity publicist out of business if she helped Stormy Daniels sell her story in 2012, according to messages entered into court evidence this week.
The bombshell claims come in instant messages between Gina Rodriguez and National Enquirer editor Dylan Howard.
At the time of their exchange, interest in Trump had reached fever pitch.
He was the clear frontrunner for the 2016 Republican nomination and Howard's then boss last week explained how he had agreed to hunt out negative stories about him in what prosecutors claim was a 'catch and kill' agreement to help his campaign.
'I also had Donald Trump call my office 4 years ago when Stormy Daniels was going to do the Trump mistress story,' Rodriguez wrote in April 2016.
'He threatened that I would never do business again in entertainment.'
In messages presented to the court hearing Donald Trump's 'hush money' trial, publicist Gina Rodriguez claims the Apprentice star telephoned her office in 2012 when Stormy Daniels was first shopping around her story to magazines
A hush money payment to Stormy Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, is at the heart of the business fraud case against Trump which is playing out in Manhattan court
The publicist's name is redacted from the exhibit, but Wednesday's court transcript and the title of the document refer to Rodriguez.
Trump is accused of 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide hush money payments to the porn star.
He denies all the charges and insists the prosecution is part of a witch hunt to keep him from winning back the White House in November.
Far from being a dry case about invoices and wire transfers, evidence so far has illuminated the murky world of chequebook journalism and Trump's celebrity lifestyle.
The exchanges documented in People's Exhibit 171A describe the alleged role played by the National Enquirer's parent company, American Media Inc, in buying up Daniels' story.
Rodriguez explains why her client did not go public in 2012.
'So we killed the story because I thought he would sue me,' she writes.
'But Stormy was his mistress.'
She agrees to send Howard more information about her story by email.
'InTouch was going to do it before she passed a [redacted by court] but he scared all of and now Stormy won't do anything,' Rodriguez writes on April 7, 2016.
The latest batch of messages to be entered into evidence were between publicist Gina Rodriguez and National Enquirer
