When Donald Trump's lawyer, Susan Necheles, attempted to discredit adult film actress Stormy Daniels on the stand during Trump's hush money trial earlier this week, she took this absurd position: assuming that a sex worker has no integrity.
“Do you have a lot of experience making fake sex stories seem real?” -Necheles asked.
“Wow,” Daniels said. “I wouldn't say it like that. “Sex in movies is very real, like what happened to me in that room.”
Daniels' response was smart and quick and left Necheles playing catch-up after his question backfired. The defense attorney should have known that this would be the case. The porn brand is real sex. And the idea that working in porn automatically makes you a liar or an amoral person is deeply offensive: a holdover from outdated attitudes about sex work and what women, in particular, should and shouldn't do with their lives. .
“That room” Daniels mentioned referred to the Lake Tahoe hotel room where she said she and Trump had consensual sex in 2006. At issue in the court case is whether Trump falsified business records to cover up what prosecutors They say they are money refunds to keep quiet. payments made to Daniels in an illegal attempt to influence the 2016 election. Trump denies everything, including that he had sexual relations with Daniels. So her credibility is something her lawyer wants to undermine.
Daniels has found success as an actress, director and writer in the adult film industry and is unapologetic about her work and her ambition. Her integrity does not depend on whether her industry is appreciated or despised. Let's hope the jurors understand it. I hold her in higher esteem than I do the CEOs of respected industries whom we have assumed, based on the prestige of their position, were honest and honorable only to discover that they were not. Disgraced and imprisoned CEOs Elizabeth Holmes and Sam Bankman-Fried come to mind. So much for the assumptions.
Daniels attempted to sell her story to the media before Trump and his then-attorney, Michael Cohen, reportedly submitted a $130,000 hush offer. So she is transactional. (So is Trump.) That's not evidence of lying. Necheles is also delving into alleged inconsistencies in Daniels' accounts of the evening she spent with Trump. That's fair play.
Accusing Daniels of making up the whole sex story with Trump because she's a porn star who makes a living having sex on screen is not.
