Stormy Daniels’ husband says they’ll probably leave the country if Trump is acquitted
The husband of adult film actress Stormy Daniels said Tuesday there was a “good chance” the couple would leave the country if the former president Donald Trump is acquitted during his criminal trial in Manhattan.
Barrett Blade spoke to CNN Erin Burnett about the vitriol his wife, who is a key figure in the controversy over a 2016 hush money payment allegedly made to Daniels on Trump’s behalf, has faced.
“Anyway, I don’t think it’s getting any better for her.” I think if it’s not guilty, we need to decide what to do. There’s a good chance we’ll leave this country,” Blade said on “OutFront,” adding that if Trump were convicted, he believed Daniels would still face hatred from the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s supporters.
“I don’t see it as a win-win situation anyway,” he said. “I know we would like to move on with our lives. I know she wants to move past this. We just want to do what I guess you would say normal people can do in some ways, but I don’t know if it ever will be, you know, and that breaks my heart.
Daniels, real name Stephanie Clifford, claims she had a one-night stand with Trump in 2006 and was paid in 2016 to keep quiet about the affair. Prosecutors say Trump broke the law by falsifying business records to pay off his former lawyer. Michael Cohen and concealing a “hush money” payment made to Daniels on Trump’s behalf. The controversy dates back to January 2018, when the Wall Street Journal reported the payment of $130,000. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denied the affair.
On the witness stand last week, Daniels described her encounter with Trump at a celebrity golf tournament, in addition to the salacious details of her alleged sexual relationship with him. She also testified to the interest Trump and Cohen appeared to have had in buying her story after the “Access Hollywood” tape was released just before the 2016 election.
During cross-examination, Trump’s lawyers attacked Daniels’ credibility. Attorney Susan Necheles accused her of fabricating the alleged sexual encounter in order to make money. Daniels pushed back and insisted she was telling the truth.
“If this story was false, I would have written it to be much better,” Daniels said of his meeting with Trump.
Asked by Burnett about the defense’s claim that Daniels made up his story, Blade echoed his wife’s comments, describing her as “a brilliant writer” and adding that she would have written something “much better than this what she said about the Trump story.” »
Blade also noted that Daniels just wanted to “get on with his life.”
“As boring as it is for the media to keep hearing it over and over again, it sucks for her to have to keep saying the same thing over and over again,” Blade said. “It weighs on her, but she’s a warrior.”
Blade also said that the hate his wife receives doesn’t really matter to him because Daniels “is used to all this” and that she was prepared because she continues to receive a lot of vitriol and negative comments on social media.
“It’s her whole fight for what she believes is right and to tell the truth, and I don’t think a lot of people realize that,” he continued.
CNN’s Shania Shelton, Jeremy Herb, Lauren del Valle and Kara Scannell contributed to this report.
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