My hands were shaking so badly

Stormy Daniels took the witness stand on Tuesday Donald TrumpIn the hush money trial, jurors will hear a description of a sexual encounter the porn actress said she had with him in 2006, which led to her being paid to remain silent during the presidential election 10 years later.

Jurors appeared enthralled as Daniels, despite repeated objections from defense attorneys and occasional admonitions from the judge, delivered a detailed and sometimes graphic account of an encounter that Trump had denied. Trump stared straight ahead as Daniels entered the courtroom, later shaking his head and whispering to his lawyers as she testified.

The testimony was by far the most anticipated spectacle in a trial that oscillated between tabloid elements and dry explanations of the record. The court appearance of a porn actress who says she had an intimate encounter with a former American president joins a long list of historic firsts in the case, which has already been riddled with tasteless allegations of sex, kickbacks and cover-ups. It’s unfolding as the presumptive Republican nominee makes another bid for office White House.

Their statements are central to the case because in the final weeks of Trump’s 2016 Republican presidential campaign, his then-lawyer and recruiter, Michael CohenShe paid Daniels $130,000 to keep quiet about what she said was embarrassing and unexpected sexual encounter with Trump on a celebrity golf outing in Lake Tahoe in July 2006. Trump pleaded not guilty.

Citing questioning from a prosecutor, Daniels described how a first meeting at a golf tournament where they discussed the adult film industry led to a “brief” sexual encounter that she said Trump initiated after taking her to dinner and back in invited to his hotel suite.

She said she didn’t feel physically or verbally threatened, even though she knew his bodyguard was outside the suite and there was a power imbalance: Trump “was bigger and blocking the way.”

After it was over she said: “It was really hard to get my shoes because my hands were shaking so much.”

“He said, ‘Oh, it was great. Let’s get back together, darling,'” Daniels continued. “I just wanted to leave.”

In the years since the encounter was announced, Daniels has become a vocal Trump opponent, telling her story in a book and on television and criticizing the former president with mocking and derogatory comments. But there was no precedent for events on Tuesday, when she faced Trump face-to-face and was asked in a austere courtroom to tell her experiences to a jury weighing whether a former American president should be convicted of serious crimes for the first time since 2010 to describe history.

She said she met Trump because the adult film studio she worked for at the time sponsored one of the holes on the golf course. They were chatting about the adult film industry and their directing skills when Trump’s group stopped by. The prominent real estate developer noted that she had to be “the smart one” when making films, Daniels recalled.

Later, in an area known as the “gift room” where celebrity golfers collected gift bags and presents, Trump remembered her as “the smart one” and asked her if she wanted to go to dinner, Daniels said.

Daniels testified that she accepted Trump’s invitation because she wanted to avoid a planned dinner with her company colleagues. She said her publicist at the time suggested in a phone call that Trump’s invitation was a good excuse to avoid the work lunch and would “make a great story” and perhaps help her career.

“What could possibly go wrong?” She remembered the publicist saying.

After several conversations with the judge and Trump’s lawyers out of earshot of the jurors, prosecutor Susan Hoffinger answered their questions about the encounter cautiously, instructing them to keep their answers brief and without additional details. Judge Juan M. Merchan Daniels’ attempts to describe the encounter more graphically were repeatedly rebuffed and several of her answers were struck from official court records.

Testimony to date has made clear that Trump and his campaign had been reeling at the time of paying Daniels since the release of the unprecedented “2005” on October 7, 2016.Access Hollywood“Footage of him bragging about grabbing women by their genitals without their permission.

The candidate spoke Cohen and Hope Hickshis campaign’s press secretary, called the next day to limit the damage from the tape and keep his alleged affairs out of the press, according to testimony.

Cohen paid Daniels after her then-lawyer Keith Davidson indicated she was willing to make on-the-record statements to the National Enquirer or on television confirming a sexual encounter with Trump. National Investigator Editor Dylan Howard Publisher notified David Pecker and then, at Pecker’s direction, Cohen said that Daniels was making efforts to go public with her claims, prosecutors said. Daniels had previously tried to sell her story to another celebrity gossip magazine, Life & Style, in 2011.

Daniels’ testimony marked a complete about-face from Monday, when the jury heard from two witnesses, including a former Trump Organization controller, who gave a mechanical but crucial account of how the company returned payments supposedly intended to to prevent embarrassing stories from surfacing, and then recorded them as legal fees in a way that Manhattan prosecutors said violated the law.

Jeffrey McConney’s statement

The testimony of Jeffrey McConney represented a key building block for prosecutors trying to pull back the curtain on an alleged cover-up of corporate documents about transactions aimed at protecting Trump’s Republican presidential nomination during a crucial phase of the race. The focus was on Cohen’s $130,000 payment to Daniels and the subsequent restitution Cohen received.

McConney and another witness testified that the reimbursement checks were withdrawn from Trump’s personal account.

McConney acknowledged under cross-examination that Trump never asked him to record the refunds as legal expenses and that he did not discuss the matter with him at all. Another witness, Deborah Tarasoff, an accounts payable clerk for the Trump Organization, said under questioning that she did not receive permission from Trump himself to write the checks in question and acknowledged that she had no reason to believe Trump was hiding anything.

Prosecutors continue to push for their star witness, Cohen, who pleaded guilty in connection with the hush money payments. He is expected to undergo harsh cross-examination by defense attorneys seeking to undermine his credibility with jurors.

Trump is accused of falsifying business documents in 34 cases in connection with the hush money payments. The trial is the first of his four criminal cases to go before a jury.