Michael Avenatti says Stormy Daniels falsified business records to avoid paying Trump court ordered legal fees

In a letter shared on X, Avenatti, who has said that he would testify against Daniels in the Trump trial currently underway in New York, stated that Daniels had colluded with documentary producers to cover up payment she received for appearing on camera in a "puff piece" designed to "trash" both Donald Trump and Avenatti.

"Will DA Bragg pursue charges against her for falsification of business records, fraud, etc?" he asked.

He detailed being called by producer Sarah Gibson, who asked him to appear in the documentary with Daniels. Avenatti's first question, he said, was to ask if Daniels was being paid for her appearance. Gibson said Daniels was being paid, but that the payments were being made in a circuitous route to aid Daniels in evading court-ordered payments to Trump.

"To say that I was shocked when I was told this would be an understatement. A woman I had never met or spoken to before was admitting to me, on a recorded line, that Daniels, she and others had engaged in multiple overt criminal acts (state and federal), including falsification of business records, wire fraud, and fraudulent transfers, all in an effort to defraud Trump and avoid paying him what he was legally due."

Avenatti said he "participated in the documentary."

In 2023, Stormy Daniels was ordered to pay Trump $120,000 in legal fees over a failed defamation suit. In response to the order to pay, Daniels said "I will go to jail before I pay a penny."

Daniels has been testifying this week in the case brought by Bragg in New York City in which he claimed that Trump's attorney Michael Cohen paid Daniels to keep quiet about an alleged affair the two had many years ago. While Daniels has previously and repeatedly denied the affair, she testified in detail, in what she admitted was rehearsed testimony, about an alleged encounter with Trump.

Bragg has claimed that Trump's payments to his attorneys should not have been classified in bookkeeping records as legal fees and that those payments amounted to election interference. Trump has said that the payments made to his attorney were legal fees.