The affair involves a $130,000 payment that Trump's private attorney Michael Cohen made to porn actress Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 presidential election. Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, says she had an affair with Trump years before the election, which Trump denies.
The payment was apparently intended to prevent Clifford from going public, which could have harmed Trump during the election campaign. However, the cash flows may have violated campaign finance laws.
Trump again denied ever having an affair with Clifford on Thursday and described the investigation against him as politically motivated. "I have done absolutely nothing wrong, I have never had an affair with Stormy Daniels, nor would I have wanted to have an affair with Stormy Daniels," the 76-year-old Republican wrote on Truth Social.
Apparently with a view to paying the porn actress money, he said he had relied on his attorney to settle a "blackmail" matter. Manhattan Attorney Alvin Bragg's investigation has described Trump as a "political witch hunt" targeting him as the Republican nominee's top candidate for the 2024 election. The right-wing populist announced in November that he wanted to run in next year's presidential election.
Should Trump be indicted, it would be the first time a former US President has been indicted. An indictment is anything but certain. However, the New York Times wrote that an invitation to testify before a grand jury "almost always indicates that indictment is imminent".
Trump is not only in the sights of investigators in the Stormy Daniels affair. Investigations are underway in southern Georgia into possible illegal interference with the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.
A US special investigator is also examining Trump's responsibility for the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021 and the taking of numerous secret documents from the White House to Trump's private estate Mar-a-Lago in the state of Florida after the Republican's term ended. However, Trump has - at least so far - been charged in one of these investigations.
