- [Narrator] Donald Trump's alleged role
in paying hush money to a porn star
could soon lead to criminal charges
against the former president, a first in US history.
Exclusive articles The Wall Street Journal published
in 2018 triggered this investigation into Trump.
And reporter Joe Palazzolo is still digging.
- I did not expect five years later
to be still talking about this case at all.
- [Narrator] As a grand jury
is concluding its investigation,
let's look at the reporting that led to this pivotal moment
and what could come next.
Let's start in 2016, days before Trump's election victory.
- [Crowd] U-S-A, U-S-A.
- [Narrator] And years before porn star Stormy Daniels
would tell her side in Prime Time.
- And you had sex with him?
- Yes.
- You were 27, he was 60.
Were you physically attracted to him?
- No.
- Not at all. - No.
- [Narrator] During the 2016 campaign,
Daniels and her manager were shopping her story
of an alleged affair with Trump from a decade earlier.
- She'd been onto successful celebrity magazines
and the tabloids didn't wanna buy it.
- [Narrator] Michael Cohen, Trump's personal lawyer
at the time, was also approached
with an offer to buy Daniels' story.
That was in September.
- Cohen says, go to hell, essentially, no.
And then Access Hollywood happens.
- [Trump] And when you're a star, they let you do it.
You can do anything.
- [Billy Bush] Whatever you want.
- [Trump] Grab 'em by the (beep).
- And then boom, it's like a 180.
Stormy's lawyer is back on the phone with Cohen
and they're hashing out a deal.
- [Narrator] Daniels agrees to $130,000 for her story
in exchange for her silence,
and signs a contract on October 28th, 2016.
Journal reporters caught wind of Daniels around this time
and over months worked to piece the story
of the payment together.
- So the first story ran in January, 2018,
and it was pretty bare bones.
I mean, what we said is what we knew
which is that Michael Cohen had arranged $130,000 payment
to Stormy Daniels.
And so we had confirmed
that he'd used a Delaware Limited Liability Company,
a shell company essentially, to transfer the payment.
And so those were the two stories that we reported in 2018
that really got the ball rolling.
- [Narrator] A political firestorm erupted.
Trump denied the affair and knowledge of the payment.
- Well, you'll have to ask Michael Cohen.
Michael's my attorney and you'll have to ask Michael.
- [Narrator] Days later, FBI agents raided Cohen's home,
which Trump called...
- A disgraceful situation.
It's a total witch hunt.
I've been saying it for a long time.
- [Narrator] Federal prosecutors charged Cohen
with campaign finance violations and other federal crimes.
He pleaded guilty to all of the charges,
telling a federal judge at the time
that Trump had directed him to buy Daniels' silence.
- I am providing the committee today with several documents,
and these include a copy of the check
Mr. Trump wrote from his personal bank account
after he became President to reimburse me
for the hush money payments I made
to cover up his affair with an adult film star
and to prevent damage to his campaign.
- [Narrator] Despite Cohen implicating Trump in the crime
federal prosecutors dropped the case,
but that still left the possibility of state charges
as the Trump organization is based in New York.
Cyrus Vance, the Manhattan District Attorney, stepped in.
Ultimately, the DA's office decided not to bring charges.
When Vance retired, the new DA, Alvin Bragg,
initially decided not to pursue
the hush money investigation.
- There is a felony of falsifying business records charge
but that requires the records to have been falsified
to conceal another crime or to commit another crime.
And, you know, the obvious other crime here
is the campaign finance crime,
the actual payoff of Stormy Daniels
to protect Donald Trump's campaign.
But there has never been a case or a judge,
a state judge has never blessed the use
of felony falsifying business records
premised on a federal charge.
In other words, these are state prosecutors,
they're bringing a state charge
and in order to elevate it to a felony
they have to say that the crime that was concealed
by falsifying these business records was a federal crime.
So that's like a weird thing.
And they decided it was gonna be too risky
to bring a case that was gonna rely
on an untested legal theory.
- [Narrator] But then, in January,
Bragg impaneled a new grand jury
to investigate the payments.
He hasn't said publicly why he changed course.
- Everyone's surprised, frankly,
because our reporting and others had shown
that the office had looked at this so many times,
had looked at it through kind of different lenses
and decided each time not to bring it.
The feds had passed up on the chance to bring it.
So, now, here we are in 2023 and what's changed?
I mean we don't, we don't really know yet.
- [Narrator] One thing that hasn't changed
is Cohen's involvement.
Trump's former lawyer testified
before the grand jury last week
and could be called to speak with them again.
- This is all about accountability.
He needs to be held accountable for his dirty deeds.
- [Narrator] Trump has denied the affair and any wrongdoing,
calling the investigation politically motivated.
The Manhattan DA's office did not respond
to request for comment.
If Bragg brings charges against the former president
it could shine more light on what happened in 2016.
- An indictment's just an allegation, right?
There are still, you know, questions that I have
even after having worked on this for so long.
If the charges are focused on falsifying business records,
you know, like what did Trump know about repaying Cohen?
There's a lot of sort of gaps in our knowledge
about how this all went down.
And then, you know, I'm really curious to see
if the DA has like learned some new facts.
Charges, if they come, I think would would sort of begin
like just one more chapter.
(Joe laughs)