this is an individual that lies on a consistent basis.
if it was up to me which it's not I would indict the president.
I'm gonna put Donald Trump on trial.
You are something of a folk hero now.
well wait until we actually accomplish something in the coming months.
Who is Michael Avenatti? Well that really depends on who you ask.
Creepy porn lawyer. He's a lowlife. He's Donald Trump's worst nightmare...
He's got a fearlessness right, and he's fighter.
Stormy Daniels court beefcake Michael Avenatti
but there's one thing we can all agree on
Michael Avenatti has thrust himself onto the national scene as
Donald Trump's most virulent adversary.
I think the president will not serve out his term.
Michael Avenatti's gotten significant traction in his legal battles against
president Trump and the president's allies .
Are you trying to win a case or take down a president?
This is a search for the truth.
this is the story of how a powerful lawyer and his
porn star client became Trump's worst nightmare.
This president has had his eye off the ball now basically from day one.
But I don't think the president wants to sit
across a conference room table from me and answer questions under oath but
if he does perhaps we can do it this afternoon.
Now there is one thing Michael avenatti and Donald Trump do have in common- they both love the camera
He doesn't have much of a political record but he does know his way around a TV studio.
A day doesn't seem to go by without at least one news outlet giving
Mr. avenatti some oxygen and that unflappable look on his face is no bluff
it's been cultivated from years of experience of winning high-profile legal battles
But how did he get here?
Michael Avenatti was born in 1971 in Sacramento, California.
Armed with a bachelor's in political science he went to George Washington law school
and graduated first in his class.
As a high-powered LA attorney he won more than a billion dollars in judgments for
his clients including a 10 million dollar defamation case against Paris Hilton
and a 40 million dollar embezzlement lawsuit involving KPMG.
It was in 2006 when avenatti first went to battle with Donald Trump .
Avenatti sued Trump and TV producer Mark Burnett for allegedly stealing his clients idea for
their hit show The Apprentice.
The case led to a settlement for an undisclosed amount.
These and other big successes gained him a reputation for his bold and
fearless tactics in and out of the courtroom.
He spent a couple of years working at a political consulting firm run by rahm emanuel and that was
where he says that he really learned how to play hardball.
When preparing for cases Avenatti will refer to the title of a book by former Intel CEO Andrew Grove
which is only the paranoid survive.
did we mention that he's also a professional race car driver?
A self-professed adrenaline junkie Avenatti raced in
over 30 professional races. Though he's yet to quit his day job one of his teams
did place seventh in its class in 2015.
Racing aspirations aside Avenatti claims
to be motivated by his desire to argue strong cases for good people.
one such person turns out to be stormy Daniels
Avenatti burst onto the national stage
this year as a lawyer representing Stormy Daniels in her hush money case
involving President Trump.
Are they gotta come out and call my client a liar once again?
I hope they do because we're gonna double down and I think Michael Cohen as
I've been saying for some time is gonna flip on the president.
He scored a huge victory when Michael Cohen pled guilty to campaign finance fraud and named
Trump as an unindicted co-conspirator to pay off a porn star just prior to the 2016 election.
We're gonna get a chance to depose Michael Cohen and Donald Trump
Avenatti is banking on the 1998 precedent that got Clinton impeached for
lying under oath. If that ruling is upheld Trump may be forced to take the
stand which Avenatti believes will put him in a very uncomfortable position
having to choose between either lying under oath revealing an unseemly
cover-up or trigger a constitutional crisis by ignoring a subpoena,
none of which are good options for the president
but the case hasn't been all victorious- a federal judge dismissed stormy Daniels
defamation lawsuit against President Trump calling her quote horse face and
calling her lawyer third-rate.
but that hasn't deterred a Avenatti's resolve.
He's taken up a number of other legal challenges to the Trump administration
as well. He's representing multiple cases involving children separated from their
families in the aftermath of Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration.
This policy should end immediately.
As well as representing Julie Swetnick in the sexual misconduct allegations against
newly appointed Supreme Court justice, Brent Kavanagh.
All of these women cannot be lying it doesn't make any sense.
He's even gone so far as to go justice Kavanaugh to sue his client.
Are you trying to out Trump Trump by using the media?
But his risky tactics backfired
this time and many Democrats were furious with avenatti for pushing
unsubstantiated claims which ultimately helped confirm Kavanaugh.
Certainly his tactics are very Trumpian, he says outrageous things
uses oneupmanship to force the hands of his opponent just the same way
that President Trump does.
I will tell you that at least one of those women
claimed to be pregnant at the time.
This way he could be really worthy adversary of the president in the end.
And now there's this.
There's been a lot of attention about whether you're gonna run for president in 2020
how serious are you at this moment in time about that?
Just so we're clear on this- the lawyer suing the president is
considering running for president. Talk about unprecedented.
Most of the world knows you as the lawyer for a porn star and somebody that goes on cable TV a lot
why should you be taken seriously as a presidential candidate?
Its not yet clear how serious Avenatti is about running and not just kind of being part of the media circus.
I don't know whether I'm gonna run or whether I'm not gonna run.
but considering the current landscape and landscape in which
President Trump won just two years ago anything is possible
you're currently leading the pack among 2020 contenders on the Democratic side.
But Avenatti isn't without controversy himself in October
he was ordered to pay almost five million dollars to an attorney who
worked with him in its former firm. He's also reported to owe over 1 million
dollars in federal taxes and corporate debts while enjoying a lavish lifestyle
not to mention a bitter divorce.
Sleaze bag. Sleaze bag!
But in the era of Trump where scandals are so normal no one knows if that will even matter.
The Democrats need to fight fire with fire.
When they go low I say we hit harder.
One thing is certain- Avenatti versus Trump would make great television!