Trump mocks sketch of man who allegedly threatened stormy Daniels

The president mocked the sketch, which the pornographic actress, Stephanie Clifford (known as Stormy Daniels) released Tuesday. His tweet accompanied a post from another Twitter user, who said the man looked like Clifford’s former husband.

“A total con job,” Trump wrote in his first ever Twitter post related to Clifford, who has said she had an affair with Trump in 2006. In making fun of the sketch, Trump shared it with his more than 50 million Twitter followers. And, according to Clifford’s attorney, the president’s comments Wednesday could lead to a defamation claim.

Trump’s representatives have denied that the two had an affair. And the president’s advisers have cautioned him not to make public comments or post tweets about the matter.

Clifford says the man in the sketch threatened her in a Las Vegas parking lot in 2011 while she was with her infant daughter.

“A guy walked up on me and said to me, ‘Leave Trump alone. Forget the story.’ And he leaned around and looked at my daughter and said, ‘That’s a beautiful little girl, it would be a shame if something happened to her mom,'” Clifford said in March during an interview aired on “60 Minutes.”

Daniels and her attorney, Michael Avenatti, are offering a $131,000 award for the person who identifies the man in the sketch.

Clifford has said that Trump’s longtime lawyer and fixer, Michael D. Cohen, paid her $130,000 to keep quiet about an affair she says she had with Trump while he was married. The FBI has been investigating Cohen for bank fraud related to this payment and other matters.

Clifford filed a lawsuit in California last month in which she claims a nondisclosure agreement she signed shortly before the 2016 presidential election was null and void because Trump never signed it.

Trump, who is known for tweeting his mind, has said little about the scandal. This month, he denied knowing about the payment Cohen made. Avenatti has said that the president’s denial only helps his client’s case. In his own Twitter post Wednesday, Avenatti appeared to regard the president’s tweet as a gift and called Trump a “completely unhinged, undisciplined opponent.”

“In my experience, there is nothing better in litigation than having a completely unhinged, undisciplined opponent who is prone to shooting himself in the foot,” Avenatti said. “Always leads to BIGLY problems…like new claims (i.e. defamation). LOL. #xmas #hanukkah #basta.”

Avenatti also tweeted on Wednesday that evidence collected in an FBI raid on Cohen’s office and residences would show documents and recordings “showing con job after con job.”

In an interview with The New York Times, Avenatti said the president’s tweet calling the sketch a “total con job” could lead to a defamation lawsuit. Avenatti said the president “has now effectively called my client a liar” and accused Clifford of “perpetrating a con.” Avenatti said he will decide in the coming days whether to pursue such a claim.

David A. Super, a law professor at Georgetown University, said Trump’s tweet Wednesday is not likely to have an impact on his legal problems.

“I don’t think it hurts him,” Super said, because Trump tweeted about information that is in the public domain and does not reveal inside knowledge that only he would know.

Super said a defamation suit is probably a “stretch.” At this point, Super said, Clifford is a public figure and therefore would have to prove that Trump knew he was being dishonest or reckless when he said the sketch amounted to a “con job.”

“Of his tweets, I think it’s one of the better designed, one of the less self-destructive,” Super said.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Trump mocks sketch of man who allegedly threatened stormy Daniels

“A sketch years later about a nonexistent man,” he said. “A total con job, playing the Fake News Media for Fools (but they know it)!”

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