Monday, October 15, 2018

Stormy Daniels Lawsuit Dismissed, Trump Entitled To Legal Fees

The Judge has dismissed porn actress and stripper Stephanie Clifford's lawsuit against President Trump, according to one of Trump's attorneys. The judge says that Trump is entitled to legal fees from Daniels, which Trump's legal team says will be determined at a later date.

A statement from Trump's legal team reads: 
United States District Judge S. James Otero issued an order and ruling today dismissing Stormy Daniels' defamation lawsuit against President Trump. The ruling also states that the President is entitled to an award of his attorneys' fees against Stormy Daniels. A copy of the ruling is attached. No amount of spin or commentary by Stormy Daniels or her lawyer, Mr. Avenatti, can truthfully characterize today's ruling in any way other than total victory for President Trump and total defeat for Stormy Daniels. The amount of the award for President Trump's attorneys' fees will be determined at a later date.
Daniels' attorney Michael Avenatti responded to the dismissal, tweeting: "We will appeal the dismissal of the defamation cause of action and are confident in a reversal," while stating that Daniels' other claims against Trump and Cohen "proceed unaffected."
Last week Trump's legal team argued that it made no sense for them to keep fighting in court over a $130,000 hush payment received by Clifford, also known as Stormy Daniels, as she invalidated the non-disclosure agreement she signed with Trump's longtime fixer and lawyer, Michael Cohen.
The lawsuit is moot because Trump has consented that the agreement, as she has claimed, was never formed because he didn’t sign it and he has agreed not to try to enforce it, Trump said in his court filing. The company created by Cohen to facilitate the non-disclosure agreement, which initially said Clifford faced more than $20 million in damages for talking, said in September that it wouldn’t sue to enforce the deal. -Yahoo
Michael Avenatti's terrible October
This month has not treated Stormy's attorney well. Michael Avenatti went from Democrat darling during his representation of Daniels, to scapegoat over Justice Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court after he introduced an 11th hour claim by a woman who said Kavanaugh orchestrated gang-rape parties in the early 1980s - an allegation thought by many to have derailed otherwise legitimate claims against the Judge.
Less than two weeks later Avenatti came under fire after he launched a now-deleted fundraising page for Texas Democratic Senate candidate Beto O'Rourke.
In the fine print, O'Rourke supporters discovered that half the proceeds went to Avenatti's Fight PAC, which he formed a little over seven weeks ago. 

“It is pretty skeezy,” said Brendan Fischer, the director of federal and FEC reform programs at the Campaign Legal Center, of the fundraising tactic. “If Avenatti wanted to raise funds for Beto O’Rourke’s campaign, he could just share a link to the Beto for Senate donation page. But he didn’t. Avenatti’s tweet gave viewers the impression their donation would support Beto for Senate, and given how easy it is to make a one-click donation through ActBlue, some viewers could miss the fine print disclosing that their donation would be split with Avenatti’s PAC.”-Daily Beast
Avenatti called the criticism "complete nonsense," noting that Senators Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris "do the same thing." Perhaps sensing he'd made a huge mistake, Avenatti deleted the page - telling the Daily Beast in a text message: "It wasn’t worth the nonsense that resulted from people that don’t understand how common this is."
The question now is; after three strikes, is Avenatti out?

 source zerohedge
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