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AP:
National
Enquirer
had safe
with
damaging
Trump
stories
By
JEFF
HORWITZ
APNews.com
WASHINGTON
- The
National
Enquirer
kept a
safe
containing
documents
on
hush-money
payments
and
other
damaging
stories
it
killed
as part
of its
cozy
relationship
with
Donald
Trump
leading
up to
2016
presidential
election,
people
familiar
with the
arrangement
told The
Associated
Press.
The
detail
comes as
several
media
outlets
reported
Thursday
that
federal
prosecutors
have
granted
immunity
to
National
Enquirer
chief
David
Pecker,
potentially
laying
bare his
efforts
to
protect
his
longtime
friend
Trump.
Trump’s
former
lawyer
Michael
Cohen
pleaded
guilty
this
week to
campaign
finance
violations
alleging
he,
Trump
and the
tabloid
were
involved
in
buying
the
silence
of a
porn
actress
and a
Playboy
model
who
alleged
affairs.
Several
people
familiar
with the
Enquirer’s
parent,
American
Media
Inc.,
who
spoke to
the AP
on
condition
of
anonymity
because
they
signed
non-disclosure
agreements,
said the
safe was
a great
source
of power
for
Pecker,
the
company’s
CEO.
The
Trump
records
were
stored
alongside
similar
documents
pertaining
to other
celebrities’
catch-and-kill
deals,
in which
exclusive
rights
to
people’s
stories
were
bought
with no
intention
of
publishing
to keep
them out
of the
news. By
keeping
celebrities’
embarrassing
secrets,
the
company
was able
to
ingratiate
itself
with
them and
ask for
favors
in
return.
But
after
The Wall
Street
Journal
initially
published
the
first
details
of
Playboy
model
Karen
McDougal’s
catch-and-kill
deal
shortly
before
the 2016
election,
those
assets
became a
liability.
Fearful
that the
documents
might be
used
against
AMI,
Pecker
and the
company’s
chief
content
officer,
Dylan
Howard,
removed
them
from the
safe in
the
weeks
before
Trump’s
inauguration,
according
to one
person
directly
familiar
with the
events.
It
was
unclear
whether
the
documents
were
destroyed
or
simply
moved to
a
location
known to
fewer
people.
AMI
did not
immediately
respond
to a
request
for
comment.
Pecker’s
immunity
deal was
first
reported
Thursday
by
Vanity
Fair and
The Wall
Street
Journal,
citing
anonymous
sources.
Vanity
Fair
reported
that
Howard
was also
granted
immunity.
Court
papers
in the
Cohen
case say
Pecker
“offered
to help
deal
with
negative
stories
about
(Trump’s)
relationships
with
women
by,
among
other
things,
assisting
the
campaign
in
identifying
such
stories
so they
could be
purchased
and
their
publication
avoided.”
The
Journal
reported
Pecker
shared
with
prosecutors
details
about
payments
that
Cohen
says
Trump
directed
in the
weeks
and
months
before
the
election
to buy
the
silence
of
McDougal
and
another
woman
alleging
an
affair,
porn
star
Stormy
Daniels.
Daniels
was paid
$130,000.
McDougal
was paid
$150,000.
While
Trump
denies
the
affairs,
his
account
of his
knowledge
of the
payments
has
shifted.
In
April,
Trump
denied
he knew
anything
about
the
Daniels
payment.
He told
Fox News
in an
interview
aired
Thursday
that he
knew
about
payments
“later
on.”
In
July,
Cohen
released
an audio
tape in
which he
and
Trump
discussed
plans to
buy
McDougal’s
story
from the
Enquirer.
Such a
purchase
was
necessary,
they
suggested,
to
prevent
Trump
from
having
to
permanently
rely on
a tight
relationship
with the
tabloid.
“You
never
know
where
that
company
— you
never
know
what
he’s
gonna be
—” Cohen
says.
“David
gets hit
by a
truck,”
Trump
says.
“Correct,”
Cohen
replies.
“So, I’m
all over
that.”
While
Pecker
is
cooperating
with
federal
prosecutors
now, AMI
has
previously
declined
to
participate
in
Congressional
inquiries.
Last
March,
in
response
to a
letter
from a
group of
House
Democrats
about
the
Daniels
and
McDougal
payments,
AMI
General
Counsel
Cameron
Stracher
declined
to
provide
any
documents,
writing
that the
company
was
“exempt”
from
U.S.
campaign
finance
laws
because
it is a
news
publisher,
and it
was
“confident”
it had
complied
with all
tax
laws. He
also
rebuffed
any
suggestion
that AMI
had
leverage
over the
president
because
of its
catch-and-kill
practices.
“AMI
states
unequivocally
that any
suggestion
that it
would
seek to
‘extort’
the
President
of the
United
States
through
the
exercise
of its
editorial
discretion
is
outrageous,
offensive,
and
wholly
without
merit,”
Stracher
wrote in
a letter
obtained
by The
Associated
Press.
Former
Enquirer
employees
who
spoke to
the AP
said
that
negative
stories
about
Trump
were
dead on
arrival
dating
back
more
than a
decade
when he
starred
on NBC’s
reality
show
“The
Apprentice.”
In
2010, at
Cohen’s
urging,
the
National
Enquirer
began
promoting
a
potential
Trump
presidential
candidacy,
referring
readers
to a
pro-Trump
website
Cohen
helped
create.
With
Cohen’s
involvement,
the
publication
began
questioning
President
Barack
Obama’s
birthplace
and
American
citizenship
in
print,
an
effort
that
Trump
promoted
for
several
years,
former
staffers
said.
The
Enquirer
endorsed
Trump
for
president
in 2016,
the
first
time it
had ever
officially
backed a
candidate.
In the
news
pages,
Trump’s
coverage
was so
favorable
that the
New
Yorker
magazine
said the
Enquirer
embraced
him
“with
sycophantic
fervor.”
Positive
headlines
for
Trump, a
Republican,
were
matched
by
negative
stories
about
his
opponents,
including
Hillary
Clinton,
a
Democrat:
An
Enquirer
front
page
from
2015
said
“Hillary:
6 Months
to Live”
and
accompanied
the
headline
with a
picture
of an
unsmiling
Clinton
with
bags
under
her
eyes.
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