After court resumed for the afternoon session, David Pecker retook the stand.
The former National Enquirer publisher testified that six months after Donald Trump became president, Trump hosted a “thank-you dinner” for Pecker and some of his business associates.
After taking photos in the Oval Office — “Jared Kushner was there, Sean Spicer was there,” Pecker said — Trump asked Pecker to walk with him along the colonnade “past the Rose Garden,” Pecker recalled. The jury saw a photo of the two men on that walk.
Trump said that on that walk, Trump asked Pecker, “How’s Karen doing?” referring to Karen McDougal, who the National Enquirer had paid to catch-and-kill her story claiming a year-long relationship with Trump.
“She’s doing well. She’s quiet. All’s going well,” Pecker recalled responding.
Eight months later, in March 2018, Pecker said Trump called him about a television interview McDougal had conducted.
“He said ‘Did you see the Anderson Cooper interview with Karen McDougal?’ I said yes. He said, ‘I thought we had an agreement with Karen that she can’t give any interviews or be on any television shows.’ So I said yes we have an agreement, but I amended it,” said Pecker, who testified earlier that he had done so following the election.
Pecker testified that Trump was very upset. “He couldn’t understand why,” Pecker said. “He couldn’t believe that I did it.”
Pecker said Trump also called him after Stormy Daniels appeared on a television interview a short while later.
“He said, ‘We have an agreement with Stormy Daniels that she cannot mention my name or do anything like this, and each time she breaches the agreement it’s a $1 million penalty,'” Pecker said.
