Shes on the stand right now. Shes actually being grilled by one of trumps lawyers, susan necheles. Shes been a Backseat Player so far. Its apparent that today was her big day. Stormy daniels is on cross after hours of testifying to some of the things donald trump and his allies, enablers have spent Tens Of Thousands of dollars trying to hide and suppress. Stormy daniels went through all of the painstaking details of her 2006 Sexual Encounter with donald trump down to the pattern that she remembers seeing in the trumps hotel room. Many objections sustained. Stormy daniels described reluctantly agreeing to have dinner with donald trump, thinking it could be good for her career. At one point during their time together, she said she asked herself, quote, how did i misread this so badly to get here . Thats when it became intimate. Sitting ten feet away from the expresident , Stormy Daniels said that donald trump would call her sometimes, two to three times a week. From nbc news reporting from inside the courtroom, quote, daniels recalled trump calling with an update or a nonupdate, if he didnt have one, for The Apprentice and he would always call her honey bunch. She was offered 10,000 from in touch magazine for her story. She said, quote, i freaked out. I dont know who leaked it. I said no at first, but they said they would run it anyway. She ended up during the interview so she could, quote, control the narrative. Shortly after that, a harrowing moment for Stormy Daniels and her daughter. She told the jury she was threatened in a parking lot. Heres how she described that threat to 60 minutes in an interview in 2018. I was in a parking lot going to a Fitness Class with my infant daughter. I was taking the seats facing backwards in the backseat, diaper bag, you know, getting all the stuff out, and a guy walked up on me. And said to me, leave trump alone. Forget the story. And then he leaned around and looked at my daughter and said, a beautiful little girl. It would be a shame if something happened to her mom. And then he left. You took it as a direct threat . Absolutely. Flash forward to the year 2016 and stormys agent or manager, gina rodriguez, suggests stormy should sell her story, saying interest in her account spiked after the infamous access Hollywood Tape is released. From nbc newss reporting, quote, the prosecution asks how did you feel about the 130,000 at the time . Daniels responds, i didnt care about the amount. She was just, get it done. The money didnt matter to me. I didnt pick a number. Stormy daniels continued. The prosecution went on to ask, why didnt you ask for more money . And daniels answered, because i didnt care about the money. Testimony about their Sexual Encounter prompted team trump to move from mistrial this afternoon. Trumps lawyer, todd blanche, said her comments about her safety were prejudice judicial. The woman at the heart of the hush money case on the stand, as we speak, is where we go inwith some of our favorite reporters and friends at the table for the hour. Former executive editor, Special Correspondent for the hollywood reporter, lochlin cartwright, andrew weissmann, and deputy chief for the Southern District of new york, Christie Greenberg is back. With start with von hilliard outside the courthouse. Theres so much to say, so much to relive. We have two hours and Rachel Maddow coming to do some with us later in the show. Lets start with what is what trump is on trial for. Lets live where you and i almost always do in Stormy Daniels testimony about what happens to her story about her Sexual Encounter with donald trump from the day after the access Hollywood Tape drops. Reporter it was the day after the access Hollywood Tape dropped. About 36 hours later is when Keith Davidson and dylan howard of the National Enquirer started exchanging Text Messages about Stormy Daniels story. It was acknowledged by dylan howard, editorinchief of the National Enquirer, that if her story went public, if she went out and talked about it in the closing weeks of the 2016 election, it would be, quote, the nail in the coffin for Donald Trumps 2016 president ial campaign. Three days after the drop of the tape on october 10th is when Michael Cohen was connected to Stormy Daniels attorney, Keith Davidson. That is when negotiations over the selling of her story and ultimately the Nondisclosure Agreement with 130,000 in tow came to fruition. Stormy daniels story never became public before the 2016 election. What you heard today from Stormy Daniels testifying to this jury was a chronically of how she got there. It wasnt just a onenight stand in 2006, four months after barron trump was born, instead it was two to three times a week, receiving phone calls from donald trump in the months after, it was a meeting in January Of 2017 in hollywood at a gala for trump vodka in which she was introduced to Karen Mcdougal, all around the idea that at one point potentially she would be put onto The Apprentice or Celebrity Apprentice and this led her to trump tower, the Executive Suite where she saw the Executive Assistant and met with donald trump, again with the idea of appearing on The Apprentice dangling in front of her. Ultimately she realized she was never going to be on the show and thats when she cut off communications. Over the course of the last 18 years, from 2006 to now, the motives and understanding of what her story could mean for donald trump politically, but also for her and her own life, they have gone up and down. That is what led her today to testify for all of these hours here and answering the series of questions from the prosecution and now under crossexamination, responding to Donald Trumps attorney, when asked whether she is making money off the fact she had sex or alleged to have had sex with donald trump, she responded that this is my story. Theres so much there. Im going to start with the sex. This is not official transcript but from our reporters notes frsd the courtroom. Stormy daniels, i came out, was washing my hands, touching up my lipstick. I noticed a leather bag inside the toile retry bag. What was inside the bag . I looked. It was old spice, man stuff, all gold. Gold tweezers and stuff. I walked out of the bathroom. Prosecutor, did you try to call anyone while you were in the bathroom . Stormy daniels, when i came out of the bathroom, i expected to exit, go around the bed and back to where we were talking and say its time to go, weve been in here a long time. When i opened the door to come out, donald trump had come into the bedroom, he was wearing his boxer shorts and a tshirt. Prosecutor, how did you feel . At first i was startled like a jump scare. I wasnt expecting him to be there minus a lot of clothing. Thats when the room spun and i thought, oh, my god, what did i misread to get here . The intention was clear, someone stripped down to their underwear and posing on the bed waiting for you. When i exited, he was on the bed, she posed how he was posed. I tried to make a joke nervously and stepped out to leave. It was a fun house playing out in slow motion. I thought, great, i put myself in this bad situation. He stood up and put himself between me and a door not in a threatening way. He said, wait, i thought we were getting somewhere. He said, if you want to get out of that trailer park. She goes on to describe how she feels afterwards. She goes on to talk about all the contemporaneous people she tells afterwards. She describes no physical threat, no physical menace on the part of donald trump. But she articulates feeling then a Power Disparity that plays out for many years. He holds over her, not a promise, but a possibility of appearing on his show. He also, this was stunning to me, promises to cheat and give her all the answers. Like everything he does is a lie and a scam. Yes, that threat not threat. Shes very clear he did not threaten her. But that carrot of saying, you can be on The Apprentice and the way he did it initially, im just going to check my notes here. He said, you remind me of my daughter. She is smart and blond and beautiful and people underestimate her as well. You can show the world youre not a dumb bimbo. You can be on this show and do well and that would promote yourself. He says the women he has sex with reminds him of his daughter in the retelling. Theres that part. That part is cringeworthy. Also lends to her credibility. In the Opening Statement defense is staying that Stormy Daniels is a liar and she made all this up. She had so much detail about their conversations about talking about melania, what he was wearing at various points. She knows the tile, what the color of the tile was. I mean, theres such vivid detail, you felt like you were with her in that room. When shes describing the things he is saying to her, again, how gross so much of it is, you know, i found her to be credible when she was walking through just because of the level of detail that she was able to describe. I want to read one more thing. It isnt what people are going to be talking about tomorrow, but she tells about her childhood. She grew up in baton rouge. She lives in florida now with her partner. She shares custody of her young daughter, with her daughters partner. She and her partner have known each other 25 years. She describes her childhood in louisiana, says she came from a low income family, how her mom would disappear. She doesnt insinuate addiction clearly but its sort of left that she was in and out of her life. She said she was basically appear adult by the time she was 17. She went to a strict christian school. She studied engineering. She wanted to be a vet. She took veterinarian medicine classes. She was editor of her high school paper. She was with trump because she wanted to be taken seriously as a writer and a director. And hes asking her about the adult Film Industry. He asks her about how they protect them from stds and if they wear condoms. She says, they do, they get tested regularly. He asks when she was last tested. She basically says shes clean. Trump is known the world over as a germophobe. There are granular details in anyone covering trump knows rings true. One thing i was struck by is just if you are in a position of saying something that donald trump wants to say is false, you need to have the receipts. This is Brad Raffensperger knew somebody needed to record that. And this is the same. This is what happens if you lets just assume she is telling the truth. There are these details where she might have lots and lots of issues but the story rings true in terms of the core and why they were paying for it at the time they were. By the way, it doesnt actually matter legally, but take as a given, this is such a classic example that you with donald trump, you have to be corroborated up one side, down the other. And then you also think about if youre accepting what she says, you dont sign up for this. One thing the prosecution will come back on redirect, its very much what Stormy Daniels said, i made money and i also lost a lot, and nobody is waking up saying, oh, i cant wait to be crossexamined and have this huge mega phone criticizing me and focusing on every flaw in my life because of something that happened to me. Great point. Its a great point. Again, i mean, the none of what she describes in the beginning of the day is criminal. Picks up a woman at a golf course. She puts his bodyman, Kurt Schiller in her phone as kurt trump, she still has his number in her phone. These are all the exhibits. And he has her number. And renna graf has her number. Which she puts into Donald Trumps phone and says i saw her show up as she said at trump tower. So the level of details are something that the defense has to be a little careful with. Yes, of course, just the fact that she was paid for silence and the fact that she, of course, changed her story because once she was paid to have an nda, shes like, nothing happened. But we know something happened. Catch and kill. We know we started throwing it around because weve been talking about trump for so long. You sort of brought us inside what that looks like. How weird this arrangement was with trump. But who i thought she did some i feel bad that i always describe her as porn star Stormy Daniels. She was someone with a life and a child and her mother disappeared when she was 17. But for having sex with donald trump in tahoe, i dont want to use the word seduced, but lures her in with conversations that she thinks are about her career, about the films she directs. And then shes so, for whatever reason, eager to keep the story silent. She talks about her partner is struggling with alcoholism and postpartum after her daughter is born. I thought it was a little anatomy of whose stories can be caught and killed. And there was this retelling where the story starts bubbling up with in touch magazine and shes put in this position where she feels if she doesnt cooperate with the reporter, she wont own her story. Thats the first attempt this happens to come out. How does that get out . How does in touch have they must have had a tipoff. One of her friends might have sold her out. The reporter says, you might as well cash in as well so, therefore, own the story. That goes on. I think that was around 2011. Then the dirty website, the gossip website, then the story again resurfaces. Keith davidson manages to do a cease and desist and gets the story off until it comes back around in 2016 during the election. And we know from past evidence that gina rodriguez, her agent, dylan howards top sources, was trying to shop the story in the summer of 2016. There isnt that much interest. Fast forward to the Access Hollywood story, you have dylan howard, david pecker, very keen to take this story off the market, although david pecker is not keen to be the bank, and puts them in touch with Michael Cohen who has to do that payoff. To me it was interesting to see this series of events of her story finally come into public view. I thought it was interesting, again, understanding the Karen Mcdougal catch and kill through a lot of your appearances, i thought it was interesting that stormy came before karen. Were not sure if Karen Mcdougal will testify. The beta case is mcdougal. That is when pecker is still at the bank. Pecker comes in and says, im not a bank and cohen and Trump FalsifyBusiness Records to pay stormy. Just talk about the practice of moving from pecker as the bank to pecker drawing this line and says, i cants be laying out 130,000. As you educated to us, its so above the amount you had to work with. Talk about what happens from mcdougal to stormy. I think whats, again, important to note here is that American Media at that point, the company i was working for, we were de facto part of the campaign. I just didnt know about it at the time. We were being used as research and being used as this outfit to calm them down and take them off the market. Karen mcdougal happens. By the time Stormy Daniels is there, firstly, david pecker is aware of the Campaign Finance issues because the lawyer going at him got that advice and said, this is a bad idea. Secondly, hes annoyed hes not being paid back for these other payoffs. And says, you guys handle it. The difference is dylan howard gets intimately involved in helping this situation along mainly because of Keith Davidson is concerned about being paid. Whats interesting to me, too, and actually let me come to you, vaughn, real quickly. I understand theyre back, the crossexamination of Stormy Daniels has continued. I wonder if theres a window here where on the redirect i dont know well get to that today, if they try to compress this timeline. All the details certainly remind us this is a human being. Im guilty of this, too. Porn star Stormy Daniels, we say it like its one word. She brought herself to life today in a way that is beyond the caricature. I know some of that had a legal repercussions thats still clanging around inside that courtroom. But the gun to the head in terms of the frenetic pace, the scheme for which trump is facing Felony Charges really, you know, the launch to that is the release of access Hollywood Tape, the difference between how her story was treated before and after, is so stark and cannot be overstated, it would seem. Reporter not at all. And the fact is also, i think when we talk about the human experience, r