Stormy Daniels may have gotten on board with suing Donald Trump for defamation of character, but she claimed years later that her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, actually coerced her into filing the lawsuit and then left her to deal with the legal fees after their loss. “Avenatti filed this lawsuit without my permission and against my wishes,” tweeted Daniels in March 2022. “Once it was filed, Trump’s lawyers overwhelmed Avenatti and I was left the victim of an attorney’s fee award.” Daniels also revealed that Avenatti attempted to appeal the ruling but filed the paperwork too late “because he’s a terrible excuse for an attorney.”
Although it’s been several years since Daniels lost her case, her legal obligation to Trump came up again when she took the witness stand during his hush money trial. At one point in the trial, Trump’s lawyer, Susan Necheles, asked Daniels if her desire to skirt her financial judgment had motivated her desire to testify against him. “Isn’t it true that you are hoping that if Donald Trump is convicted, you’ll never have to pay him the more than half-a-million-dollars you owe him?” asked Necheles during court in May 2024, according to The Wall Street Journal. Daniels responded, “I hope I don’t have to pay him no matter what happens.”
