How Donald Trump paid hush-money to conceal affair with porn star

In September 1998, Stephanie Ann Gregory was making 100 dollars a show while working as a feature dancer in Cinnamon’s titty-bar in Baton Rouge Louisiana. Her colleague Devon Michaels, linked her to a pornographic production company, Wicked Pictures, in Los Angeles California. She was offered 15,000 dollars a month, and on May 1, 2002, she officially signed for Wicked.

Stephanie had been a straight-A student at Scotlandville Magnet High School and commanded a photographic memory that steered her to becoming the editor of her school newspaper. She grew up an only child of a temperamental cruel mother Sheila, and an architectural absentee father Bill, who had never wanted to have children. When Sheila was pregnant with Stephanie, she expected a boy and was inconsolable after delivering a girl, rephrasing the name she had initially chosen, Stephan Andrews, to Stephanie Ann.

At the age of five, Stephanie's father divorced her mother and moved to Alaska. Her mother's mental health deteriorated and she stopped changing clothes, cleaning her house and brushing her hair. Their home became an infestation of filth, rats and cockroaches that left eternal bite scars on Stephanie's legs.

Sheila started disappearing for days at a time and spending nights at the houses of the men she was dating. Her male neighbour, noticing that Stephanie was not parented, sexually assaulted her and her best friend Vanessa daily, when Stephanie was nine.

Film star

At the age of 17, Stephanie's boyfriend Andy, came over to visit her. As they watched TV, her mother ran downstairs screaming, jumped onto a chair in front of them, ripped off her silk nightgown and stood before them stark naked. A despondent Stephanie moved out the following day.

At 18, she had a breast augmentation and started working in Cinnamon’s. When she was recruited by Wicked Pictures, she dyed her hair blonde and changed her name to Stormy Daniels, since there was an adult film star known as Stephanie Swift.

Stormy was invited to an exquisite excursion, on July 13, 2006, in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, at the American Century Celebrity Golf Championship in Edgewood Tahoe Golf Course. The event was sponsored by Wicked and was the casino town’s grandest event of the summer.

By now, Stormy had advanced from performing in adult films, to scripting producing and directing adult movies. She became the first woman to win Best Picture and Best Director categories at the XBIZ Awards and Best Drama at AVN awards. Real Estate mogul Donald Trump, who had been invited to the celebrity event, was besotted by her directorial achievements. He invited her for dinner in Trump’s hotel suite at Harrah’s Lake Tahoe Hotel and Casino.

Stormy states in her memoir Full Disclosure that they had consensual sex in his suite, which to her frustration was so irritating.

On March 2011, Stormy's ex-husband Mike Moz, maliciously leaked particulars about Stormy and Trump's affair, to online gossip network, The Dirty. Stormy had just given birth to her daughter and was now married to Glen Crain from rock band Hollywood Undead.

She hadn't informed Glen, who was undergoing severe depression, about her fling with Trump. She covertly instructed her lawyer Keith Davidson, to send a letter to The Dirty, to restrain the site from dispelling information and quell the story.

Shortly after, a stranger approached Stormy and threatened her when she was about to walk to her fitness class in Las Vegas Nevada. The stranger promised to harm her daughter if she pursued the story about her affair with Trump. A terrified, Stormy moved to Dallas Texas with Glen and her daughter.

Shortly before the 2016 presidential election, a video that was previously filmed by Access Hollywood, of Trump bragging how he exploited his celebrity persona to grope and sexually assault women, was leaked to the public, on October 21.

Women who had been sexually assaulted by Trump in the past began to reveal secrets of their illicit relations with him.

Stormy's lawyer Keith, informed her that Trump’s then attorney Michael Cohen, was confidentially offering her $130,000 for her silence. Keith handed her a 17-page non-disclosure agreement from Cohen, which she signed, fearing for her and her daughter’s safety.

After Keith deducted his lawyer fees, $80,000 was wired to the account of Stormy's husband Glen, to prevent federal investigators from tracing the money back to her.

Gold digger

On January 12, 2018, the press started hounding Stormy. Allegations of her affair with Trump was on every major news channel, and she was wrongly being portrayed as a gold digger who beguiled Trump for money. Her husband Glen eventually uncovered details about her affair with Trump, through the press, which was relentlessly stalking him. He divorced Stormy before legally being awarded full custody of their daughter.

A non-profit watchdog group known as Common Cause, then filed a cataclysmic criminal case with the Federal Election Commission. The organisation accused Trump of violating campaign finance laws, when he made $130,000 payment to Stormy, 11 days before the election. The filing stated that the funds were paid for the purpose of influencing the 2016 presidential election. Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen and Stormy are set to testify for the prosecution, in the hush-money case that will begin on Monday April 15, 2024.

Jeff Anthony is a novelist, a Big Brother Africa 2 Kenyan representative and founder of Jeff's Fitness Centre @jeffbigbrother