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Fact check: Statement from Stormy Daniels denying an affair with Trump is from 2018

Sudiksha Kochi, USA TODAY
·3 min read

The claim: Post implies Stormy Daniels' statement is new

A March 23 Instagram post (direct link, archived link) from conservative commentator Jack Posobiec shows a 2018 statement from pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels.

"BREAKING: Signed official statement of Stormy Daniels admits affair never happened and that she was not paid 'hush money,'" reads text above the statement.

Some commenters took the post to mean the statement was just released.

"Wahooooooo ... it’s star (sic) to become very interesting!!!" reads one comment. "Who paid her???? We want the list as well."

Another comment reads, "Now we are obligated to arrest those Democrats."

The post generated over 23,000 likes in less than a day. Similar posts have spread widely on Instagram.

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Our rating: Missing context

The implied claim here is wrong. The statement in question was released in 2018. Daniels later said it was a lie and that she felt forced to sign it because of a non-disclosure agreement she had signed.

Statement was released in 2018

The Manhattan District Attorney's office is investigating former President Donald Trump for a $130,000 payment made to Daniels just before the 2016 election to silence claims that she had an affair with him, as USA TODAY reported.

But the statement from Daniels is not "breaking" news. It was released on Jan. 30, 2018, as the screenshot in Posobiec's tweet shows.

In the statement – which was widely reported on in 2018 – Daniels denied having an affair with Trump and said she wasn't paid “hush money" because it "never happened."

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Daniels did an interview on ABC talk show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” following the statement's release, where she said she didn't know where it came from and suggested that the signature on the statement was not hers.

But hours after that appearance, Daniels’ lawyer and public relations manager both asserted Daniels' commitment to the denial, according to the Associated Press. Daniels' representative Gina Rodriguez confirmed the authenticity of the signed statement to the Washington Post.

Daniels later said in a March 2018 interview with Anderson Cooper that the statement was a "lie" and that she thought there would be legal repercussions if she didn’t sign it due to a non-disclosure agreement she had signed, according to a transcript.

USA TODAY reached out to the social media users who shared the claim for comment.

The Associated Press also debunked this claim.

Our fact-check sources:

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fact check: Statement from Stormy Daniels denying affair is from 2018