The New Yorker:

Trump’s lawyers tried to portray the scrappy adult-film actress as a lying profiteer. Instead, she emerged as an credible witness who is also very good at making money.

By Naomi Fry

Donald Trump seemed to be in an impish mood, on Thursday morning, as he walked into his criminal trial in lower Manhattan. He wore a light-blue shirt and a cerulean tie underneath his navy suit jacket, looking not unlike a clear spring day, and when he passed by the reporters in the courtroom gallery, he cocked a finger gun at Greg Kelly, the conservative Newsmax host, who responded with a reassuring smile. This air of playfulness, however, was replaced by a rigid sobriety as the adult-film star Stormy Daniels approached the witness stand for her second day of testimony, her heels clicking loudly on the courtroom floor. The former President jutted his chin forward and trained his gaze on Daniels, who was dressed in a form-fitting green dress underneath a loose black jacket, her eyeglasses set on top of her long blonde hair. She looked like a no-nonsense administrative manager of, say, a C.P.A.’s office—attractive, bright, can-do.

Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, is a blunt and gregarious blonde, who has famously dubbed her triple-D silicon breasts “Thunder” and “Lightning.” She has alleged that, during a 2006 celebrity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe, she met the future President, had less-than-mediocre sex with him, and, a decade later, in the lead-up to the 2016 Presidential election, was paid a hundred and thirty thousand dollars to keep quiet about it. Michael Cohen, Trump’s lawyer and fixer at the time, transferred the money to Daniels and was then allegedly repaid by the Trump Organization, which identified the sum as a “retainer” for “services rendered.” Trump is accused of thirty-four felony counts of falsifying business records to cover up the hush-money payment and conceal damaging information before the election; he has pleaded not guilty.

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