“Michael Avenatti has to be regretting going on Tucker Carlson’s show right now… It was worse than you’re imagining,” the Daily Beast reports.
Politico: “Even if Avenatti has little chance of winning the nomination, he could still wreck the 2020 Democratic race.”
“Michael Cohen’s shell company, Essential Consultants, filed a status report Friday evening agreeing to tear up the original 2016 agreement with adult film star Stormy Daniels, in which Cohen arranged to pay her $130,000 to stay silent about her alleged affair with President Trump,” CNN reports.
Said Daniels’ attorney Michael Avenatti: “What they’re trying to do is they don’t want me to get a chance to depose Michael Cohen and Donald Trump. This is a hail Mary to try and avoid that, that’s my first guess.”
Michael Avenatti announced that he plans to hold an event countering President Trump’s campaign rally for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) in Texas next month, The Hill reports.
Said Avenatti: “I am excited to announce that I will be leading a large resistance rally in Texas at the exact same time of Trump’s… All groups are welcome to join. We must fight fire with fire and we must send a message that we will fight to make America America again.”
BuzzFeed News: “Michael Avenatti, the self-described potential 2020 contender and lawyer representing Stormy Daniels in her lawsuit against Donald Trump, is launching his own federal PAC to support Democratic candidates with ‘the size and the presence to really fight back and advocate from a position of strength as opposed to weakness.'”
“The organization, formed Thursday, will be called Fight PAC, he said in an interview here in between meetings at the Democratic Party’s annual summer meeting.”
Politico: “The media circled him. Onlookers stopped him to take selfies. His entrance into a little-known committee meeting created an unmistakable buzz. On the first day of the DNC summer meeting on Thursday, attorney Michael Avenatti proved as recognizable and media-savvy as any of the prospects considering running for the party’s presidential nomination in 2020.”
“The attorney best known for representing porn actress Stormy Daniels in her lawsuits against President Donald Trump — now flirting with a presidential run of his own — appeared eager to convince that he’s more than just a face on TV.”
Michael Avenatti said that President Trump does not want to debate him because Trump is not “intelligent” enough, The Hill reports.
Said Avenatti: “He’s a bully and I think he doesn’t like people that punch back, and I think I would be incredibly effective against him. I don’t think he’s very quick on his feet, I don’t think he’s that intelligent and I think he’d be completely outclassed.”
CBS News: Avenatti visits New Hampshire.
BuzzFeed News: “Many politicians spent their younger days working or volunteering for campaigns, and they now regale voters with stories about knocking on doors for a candidate whose virtue appealed to their young idealism.”
“But Michael Avenatti, the TV-ready lawyer representing Stormy Daniels in her legal battle with Donald Trump, began his political career as a trainee in what is now one of the least sympathetic places in Democratic politics: as an opposition researcher for the Clinton machine.”
“Now Avenatti is considering running for president, and his origin story will test a dark thesis: That what Democrats want, more than hope or change or a return to normal, is simply to destroy Donald Trump.”
Michael Avenatti told The Guardian that he has had conversations with former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman, but would not comment any further.
Said Avenatti: “I’m not going to go into the details of what I said about that. She had reached out to me a number of months ago.”
“I’ll put it this way. People forced to play defense tend to get sloppy, they tend to make mistakes. And look, if I didn’t think Michael was doing a good job, I would fire his ass…. Every time I watch him work, I think, This is what it must have been like to see the Sistine Chapel being painted. But instead of paint, Michael uses the tears of his enemies.”
— Stormy Daniels, quoted by the New York Times, about her attorney, Michael Avenatti.
Michael Avenatti, the attorney representing adult film star Stormy Daniels, says he will launch a presidential bid in 2020 if President Trump runs for re-election, Politico reports.
Said Avenatti: “If he seeks re-election, I will run, but only if I think that there is no other candidate in the race that has a REAL chance at beating him. We can’t relive 2016. I love this country, our values and our people too much to sit by while they are destroyed.”
“Stormy Daniels’ lawyer Michael Avenatti turned down $2,500 to tape an interview with former White House press secretary Sean Spicer,” the New York Post reports.
“Avenatti, President Trump’s most persistent critic, was asked to be a guest on the pilot of ‘Sean Spicer’s Common Ground’ to be shot in July.”
“A federal judge on Friday refused to grant Michael Cohen, President Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, an immediate restraining order against the attorney for adult film actress Stormy Daniels,” Reuters reports.
“Attorney Michael Avenatti’s months-long publicity tour attacking President Trump and Trump attorney Michael Cohen could be brought to an abrupt end soon if a federal judge agrees to a new request for a gag order against the ubiquitous Avenatti,” Politico reports.
“A lawyer for Cohen, Brent Blakely, asked a judge in Los Angeles Thursday to issue an order barring Avenatti from making public statements about the lawsuit Avenatti’s client, porn star Stormy Daniels, filed against Trump and Cohen in March… Blakely said an avalanche of inflammatory public comments by Avenatti—including at least 121 TV appearances and 439 tweets—is tainting the court proceeding.”
“A television show featuring Michael Avenatti, the lawyer who is suing President Trump on behalf of a pornographic film actress, and the former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci was pitched to two cable networks in recent weeks,” the New York Times reports.
“The prominent television agent Jay Sures discussed with executives at CNN and MSNBC the concept of a program where the two men would square off.”
Michael Avenatti, the attorney for adult film actress Stormy Daniels, told Morning Joe that at least two other women have credibly told him they signed hush agreements with Donald Trump over extramarital affairs.
Said Avenatti: “There’s at least two I think that are on solid ground and as the evidence rolls out over the coming months, disclosures are going to be made that my client was not alone as it relates to these payments.”
Avenatti also confirmed that the payments to the women exceeded the $130,000 paid to his client.
Daily Beast: “Inside the White House, aides say that anything related to the Stormy Daniels-Michael Cohen saga is purview of outside counsel. At the Republican National Committee, sources say, there is no rapid-response-like operation designed to counter-balance Avenatti’s numerous media appearances. Conservative outlets allied with the president have covered the drama but they have largely avoided doing the type of oppositional digging that they have undertaken on other real and perceived Trump foes. And Republican strategists seem unclear as to whether anyone is gearing up an operation any time soon.”
Said one GOP operative: “No one seems to understand why the RNC, America Rising and other GOP groups aren’t doing even basic political blocking and tackling with Avenatti. He’s essentially gotten a free pass from them.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Wonk Wire, Political Job Hunt and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
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