On the road with stripper Stormy Daniels, where porn and presidential politics collide

Year two of the Trump presidency began here overnight much like year one had ended: with his alleged ex-mistress smashing people’s faces into her bare chest at a strip club between an airport and a cemetery. Adult film star Stormy Daniels, who once claimed to have slept with Donald Trump not long after he married Melania, performed at 11pm Saturday – the anniversary of his inauguration – and 1am Sunday here on the outskirts of town. “HE SAW HER LIVE,” the Trophy Club’s flier said. “YOU CAN TOO!” The federal government remained shut down, but Daniels was open for business. ‘He chased her round the hotel room in his underpants’ She had received US$130,000 in hush money days before the 2016 election as part of a payment arranged by a Trump attorney, according to The Wall Street Journal. And now Daniels was capitalising on her new notoriety sparked by the revelation, though Trump’s attorney had issued a statement in which he and Daniels denied the payment and, on Saturday night, Daniels was largely silent in that regard. “I’m trying to think of what I can say,” said the woman of the hour, sighing and shuddering simultaneously, as if to convey she’s been through an ordeal. She was in between performances, signing autographs and taking topless photos with oglers in a corner of the smoky club. She paused, sat back on a leather couch, pursed her lips. I’m not here for the scandal. I’m here to make money off the biggest name in adult entertainment this week Jay Levy, strip club owner “It’s crazy how one moment can overshadow 15 years of work,” she finally said, running her sparkly purple fingernails over some DVDs in front of her. “I directed all these movies. I know it’s porn, but they aren’t ‘one, two, three, f***.’ These are serious.” One is a western called Wanted, and another is its sequel, Unbridled, whose tagline lacks a double entendre but fits America in 2018: “The stakes were never higher.” Congress can’t pass a budget or figure out immigration policy. The administration is talking about war with North Korea. And down in Florida, at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club, his supporters were toasting his first year. A normal Saturday at the Trophy Club brings in 100 to 150 people – and for a while on Saturday it seemed at least double that. “Make America Horny Again,” said a big sign outside, a play on Trump’s campaign slogan. Inside there was patriotic bunting on the brass railings. Red, white and blue balloons floated above each sticky table. “I’m an old grandfather, and I seized an opportunity,” said Jay Levy, the owner of the Trophy Club. “I’m a liberal. I’m a big-time liberal. … I’m not here for the scandal. I’m here to make money off the biggest name in adult entertainment this week. Next week it’s liable to be someone else.” As Levy tells it, he saw Daniels, an old friend, in The Wall Street Journal last week and tried to catch lightning in a bottle. He called her agency, and within an hour the deal was done. Did TV make Donald Trump scared of sharks? Porn star’s surprising claim It was the biggest promotional coup in Levy’s 22 years running the club, which he views as a family business, a neighbourhood joint. His daughter used to work the front door. His wife of 41 years would be in the club’s “skybox” that evening to watch the show. “We’re ‘Cheers’ with t**s,” said Levy, smoking a filtered Camel in his office earlier Saturday as the Greenville Women’s March finished downtown. “I don’t know if you can say that or not.” He blinked at a reporter taking notes. “ ‘Cheers’ with breasts?” It’s crazy how one moment can overshadow 15 years of work. I directed all these movies. I know it’s porn, but ...these are serious Stripper, porn star and director Stormy Daniels Trump’s tabloid life has fully flowered into a tabloid presidency. Headlines about the Access Hollywood tape, in which Trump joked about sexual assault, are now rivalled by accounts of his relationship with a porn star. Reporters from several major news outlets staked out the strip club for hours and hours this weekend, just in case a porn star said or did something newsworthy. As if she might vault onstage, rip off her corset and – instead of clutching a pole with her pelvis – launch a news conference. “It’s demeaning,” said Suzanne Coe, who nevertheless brought a copy of Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury for Daniels to sign as a trivia prize for her bar downtown. “And it’s demeaning we have a first lady who posed naked. I don’t think you can humiliate America any more.” Enthusiasm in the room was low. Emcees had to impugn patrons’ masculinity to goad them to the stage so that Daniels could flip them onto their backs and lower herself onto their noses. “I think Trump’s a real famous guy, and he’s been around a s*** ton of people,” said Darin Ferguson, an engineer from North Carolina here on business, watching from the safety of a back wall. “And she’s getting her 10 minutes of fame from it.” This is not the first time a stripper has entered the political fray. In 1974, Representative Wilbur Mills, was pulled over by Park Police near the Tidal Basin, and the ex-stripper in his car – stage name: “Fanne Foxe, the Argentine firecracker” – tumbled into the water during a scuffle. The congressman, up for re-election, saw his poll numbers tick up. The Argentine firecracker rebilled herself as the “Tidal Basin Bombshell” and quintupled her performance fee. Some people showed up to the Trophy Club this weekend to get that contact high, that stale but intoxicating odour of fame by association. The woman onstage maybe had had sex with the president, and maybe we should give her a dollar or two, just to say we did. As Madonna’s Material Girl bounced to a finish, Daniels prowled toward a young Greenville resident named Joe, who was standing at the edge of the runway stage. “I thought she was very brave,” one dancer, a Trophy regular, said between Daniels’ performances. Why? “Because,” the dancer said, lowering her eyes in penitence, “she’s at the end of her career.” Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, is 38. Yes, she is a porn star; she is also a mother, writer, director and advocate. In 2005 she lobbied the California legislature on behalf of the porn industry. In 2008 she talked about online safety for children at the National Press Club in Washington. In 2009 she was drafted to run for Senate in her native Louisiana against David Vitter, the conservative disgraced by his entanglement in a prostitution ring. “Politics can’t be any dirtier of a job than the one I’m already in,” she told CNN then. Little did she know. Two years later she would detail her tryst with Trump to In Touch Weekly, which did not run it until a year into his presidency. The magazine ran a transcript of the interview following The Wall Street Journal’s report that Trump’s long-time attorney Michael Cohen had arranged for the October 2016 payment to Daniels for her silence. A White House official has dismissed the story as “old, recycled reports, which were published and strongly denied prior to the election,” while Cohen released a statement signed by “Stormy Daniels” denying an affair and calling reports of a payment “completely false.” Daniels is taking her show national next month, according to marketer Chris Roberson, whose clients include the Déjà Vu and Hustler strip club chains. She is scheduled to appear in Oklahoma City next month – the flier says “THE PORN STAR THAT TRUMPS THEM ALL” and “SEE THE PORN STAR WORTH $130,000” – and then Nashville and Shreveport, Louisiana. Here in Greenville, as the second year of Trump dawned, Stormy Daniels spread out a taupe fleece blanket on stage, dropped to her knees, arched her back and began to squirt a bottle of lotion onto her chest to the sound of “Animal” by Def Leppard, as the president’s face flashed on video screens behind her.

On the road with stripper Stormy Daniels, where porn and presidential politics collide

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}She allegedly took a US$130,000 payoff to cover up an affair with Trump, but now she’s trying to cash in with her ‘Making America Horny Again’ tour

She allegedly took a US$130,000 payoff to cover up an affair with Trump, but now she’s trying to cash in with her ‘Making America Horny Again’ tour