Stormy Daniels says sexual encounter with Donald Trump left her ‘shaking’

Stormy Daniels told a court she was left “shaking” after a sexual encounter with Donald Trump, as the judge overseeing the case repeatedly admonished her for going into too much detail.

The adult film actress is the star witness in the former president’s hush money trial, which hinges on an alleged cover-up of a $130,000 payment to “silence” her in the run-up to the 2016 election.

Her name has come up countless times so far in the first criminal trial of a former US president, but on Tuesday Ms Daniels came face-to-face with the man she has for years claimed to have slept with in 2006.

Dressed in black with a ruffled, hooded cardigan, Ms Daniels swooshed past Mr Trump before proceeding to reel off salacious details about their alleged tryst in a Lake Tahoe hotel suite after a celebrity golf tournament.

Despite initially appearing nervous, Ms Daniels soon softened, often looking directly at the jury, gesturing and giggling as though she was regaling a group of old friends.

On several occasions, the visibly excitable witness was asked to slow down for the sake of the court reporter recording her testimony.

“Did you end up having sex with him on the bed?” Susan Hoffinger, for the prosecution, asked.

“Yes,” Ms Daniels replied.

“I had my clothes and my shoes off. I removed my bra. We were in missionary position,” Ms Daniels added, before the defence objected.

Following the explicit evidence, Todd Blanche, Mr Trump’s lawyer, called for a mistrial, claiming Ms Daniels’ testimony had ignored the “guardrails” set by the court.

“How can we come back from this in a way that’s fair to President Trump?” Mr Blanche asked.

New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, who on several occasions told Ms Daniels to stick to the question and had told the prosecution the level of detail was “not necessary”, rejected the request.

The judge, who himself looked uncomfortable throughout the testimony, said he was “surprised” there weren’t more objections from Mr Trump’s legal team.

“I think the witness was a little bit difficult to control,” Mr Merchan said. “I don’t think we’re at the point where a mistrial is warranted.”

Earlier, with her blonde hair tied in a messy bun, Ms Daniels described how she initially met Mr Trump at a celebrity golf tournament in 2006 when she was 27.

Mr Trump told her she must “be the smart one” because she directed as well as starred in adult films.

Later his bodyguard, Keith Schiller, asked her if she’d like to go for dinner with Mr Trump and took her number.

Ms Daniels initially responded with “eff no”, she said, but ended up meeting Mr Trump at his hotel room after consulting with her publicist who said “if nothing else you’ll get a great story”.

“What could possibly go wrong?” he added, Ms Daniels said, laughing.

The porn star described arriving at Mr Trump’s black-and-white tiled hotel suite which was “three times” the size of her apartment.

Mr Trump, who has continually attacked Ms Daniels – who he has referred to as “horseface” – on social media, was seen shaking his head, whispering and prodding his lawyers as she testified.

At one point Mr Trump, dressed in a navy suit and gold tie with his son Eric Trump sitting directly behind him, mouthed “bull----” as Ms Daniels claimed she had spanked him with a rolled-up financial magazine with his face on it.

Ms Daniels added that the pair had a “very brief” discussion about Melania Trump, who had recently given birth to their son Barron.

She told Mr Trump his wife was “very beautiful”, to which Mr Trump replied: “We don’t even sleep in the same room.”

After spending hours chatting, Ms Daniels said she went to the lavatory, which was accessed through the bedroom and when she came Mr Trump was posing on the bed.

Attempting to mimic his stance, Ms Daniels leaned back on the witness stand, put one hand on her hip and the other behind her head as though she was lying on a beach.

“I just thought to myself ‘Great, I put myself in this bad situation, what do I do?’,” Ms Daniels told the courtroom as she held onto the side of her neck.

“There was an imbalance of power for sure, he was bigger and blocking the way… but I was not threatened verbally or physically,” Ms Daniels said.

Ms Daniels, who had spoken about her upbringing in a low-income family, claimed that Mr Trump then told her: “This is the only way you’re getting out of the trailer park.”

When asking about details of the sexual act, Ms Hoffinger asked Ms Daniels if she touched Mr Trump’s skin – before defence lawyer Susan Necheles objected.

Ms Daniels said she struggled to get dressed following the encounter because “my hands were shaking so hard”.

Confidential encounter

While she had “just wanted to leave” as quickly as possible, she said Mr Trump told her: “It was great, let’s get together again honeybunch, it was great.”

She said Mr Trump did not ask her to keep their encounter confidential and did not show any concern about his wife finding out.

But she still only “told very few people that we had actually had sex because I felt ashamed that I didn’t stop it”.

Ms Daniels detailed several other meetings she had with Mr Trump in 2007, including at a Trump Vodka launch where she met Playboy model Karen McDougal, before the pair lost contact the following year.

Speaking about the $130,000 payment she received for her story about Mr Trump, Ms Daniels said she was not interested in the sum of cash.

Ms Daniels said the figure didn’t matter because she was “motivated out of fear, not money” after a man had threatened her in a car park to keep quiet about their alleged tryst after she gave an interview to In Touch magazine in 2011.

Denials of ‘extorting money’

During a terse cross-examination, Ms Daniels appeared more aggressive as she denied making up the story of her alleged sexual encounter to “extort money” from Mr Trump.

“You’ve been making money by claiming to have had sex with president Trump for more than a decade, right?” Defence lawyer Susan Necheles asked Ms Daniels.

“I’ve been making money by telling my story about what happened to me,” Ms Daniels replied, before adding that it had also cost her money.

The jury was also shown messages between Gina Rodriguez, Ms Daniels’ former manager, and Dylan Howard, former editor of the National Enquirer, in which her agent tries to sell Ms Daniels’ story.

“She’s had sex with him. She wants 100k,” Ms Rodriguez told Mr Howard in June 2016.

Speaking after court, Mr Trump appeared pleased with how Ms Daniels’ testimony had played out.

“So this was a very big day, a very revealing day as you see their case is totally falling apart,” Mr Trump said.

The Republican frontrunner added that he “should be out campaigning right now” rather than sitting in a Manhattan courtroom.

Mr Trump is charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in connection with the hush money payments. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

He also denies ever having a sexual encounter with Ms Daniels.

The trial continues.