Hush Money Conspiracy: Catch-and-Kill Scheme with AMI and Michael Cohen
Tier 1Resolved2015-06-01 to 2018-12-12
Factual Summary
Beginning in the summer of 2015, Donald Trump, his personal attorney Michael Cohen, and David Pecker, then chairman and CEO of American Media Inc. (AMI, publisher of the National Enquirer), entered into a coordinated scheme designed to suppress stories damaging to Trump's personal reputation before and during the 2016 presidential election campaign. Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York (SDNY) concluded that the scheme violated federal campaign finance law. The conduct was resolved through Cohen's federal guilty plea, an AMI non-prosecution agreement, and a civil FEC fine.
**The Catch-and-Kill Arrangement**
At a meeting in August 2015 attended by Trump, Cohen, and Pecker, the three men agreed that Pecker and AMI would serve as an early warning system for damaging stories involving Trump. Under the arrangement, when a source approached AMI or the National Enquirer with a story potentially harmful to Trump, AMI would contact Cohen, who would report to Trump. AMI would then purchase the story and bury it rather than publish it, a practice the tabloid industry refers to as "catch and kill." In exchange, AMI received favorable treatment in terms of access to Trump and positive coverage in the National Enquirer.
**The Karen McDougal Payment**
In August 2016, AMI paid former Playboy model Karen McDougal $150,000 for exclusive rights to her account of a romantic relationship with Trump. AMI contracted for the story rights with no intention of publishing them. The contract also included rights to future stories McDougal might bring involving relationships with prominent men, effectively preventing her from speaking publicly. The SDNY concluded that the payment was made in coordination with the Trump campaign and that its principal purpose was electoral influence rather than journalism.
On September 21, 2018, AMI entered into a non-prosecution agreement with the SDNY in which it formally admitted that the $150,000 payment constituted an illegal corporate campaign contribution in violation of federal campaign finance law. David Pecker separately received an individual immunity agreement and cooperated with federal investigators. In 2021, the Federal Election Commission imposed a civil fine of $187,500 on AMI to resolve the matter.
**The $130,000 Payment to Stormy Daniels**
In October 2016, adult film actress Stormy Daniels (Stephanie Clifford) sought to sell her account of a sexual encounter with Trump. Nine days before the November 2016 election, Cohen wired $130,000 to Daniels's attorney through a shell company he created for the purpose, Essential Consultants LLC. The payment was conditioned on Daniels signing a non-disclosure agreement. Cohen later stated in his guilty plea allocution that he made the payment "in coordination with, and at the direction of, a candidate for federal office," identifying Trump as Individual-1 in federal court documents.
After the election, Trump reimbursed Cohen through a series of payments recorded falsely as legal services fees under a non-existent retainer agreement. Those reimbursement transactions generated the 34 falsified business records at the center of the state criminal conviction documented in CRIM-001.
**Cohen's Federal Guilty Plea**
On August 21, 2018, Cohen pleaded guilty in the SDNY to eight federal counts including one count of making an unlawful excessive campaign contribution (the Daniels payment) and one count of causing an unlawful corporate contribution (the AMI McDougal payment). On December 12, 2018, Cohen was sentenced to three years in federal prison. His sentence ended in November 2021. Cohen's federal allocution explicitly named Trump as the candidate who directed the payments.
**FEC Complaint**
In January 2018, Common Cause filed formal complaints with the DOJ and the FEC alleging that both payments constituted unreported and illegal campaign contributions under the Federal Election Campaign Act. These complaints preceded and contributed to the federal investigations that produced the Cohen plea and the AMI agreement.
Primary Sources
1. AMI Non-Prosecution Agreement with the SDNY, September 21, 2018 (via ABC News): https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/tabloid-publisher-involved-trump-hush-money-payment-reaches/story?id=59779050
2. Michael Cohen guilty plea allocution, U.S. District Court, SDNY, August 21, 2018 (via NBC News): https://www.nbcnews.com/news/crime-courts/ex-trump-lawyer-michael-cohen-discussing-plea-deal-prosecutors-n902571
3. Michael Cohen sentencing, December 12, 2018 (via NPR): https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/676040070/michael-cohen-sentenced-to-3-years-in-prison-following-plea-that-implicated-trum
4. AMI FEC civil fine of $187,500, 2021 (via NBC News): https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/national-enquirer-publisher-pay-187-500-fine-trump-hush-money-n1269370
5. Common Cause FEC and DOJ complaint, January 2018 (via PBS NewsHour): https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/how-michael-cohen-broke-campaign-finance-law
Corroborating Sources
1. CBS News: "Donald Trump, Stormy Daniels and the $130,000 payment: A timeline": https://www.cbsnews.com/news/donald-trump-stormy-daniels-indictment-investigation-timeline-manhattan-district-attorney/
2. NPR: "Michael Cohen Sentenced to 3 Years in Prison Following Plea That Implicated Trump," December 12, 2018: https://www.npr.org/2018/12/12/676040070/michael-cohen-sentenced-to-3-years-in-prison-following-plea-that-implicated-trum
3. The Daily Beast: "Trump-Friendly AMI Admits to Playmate Hush Payment to Influence 2016 Election": https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-friendly-ami-admits-to-playmate-hush-payment-to-influence-2016-election/
4. ABC News: "Hidden world of 'catch-and-kill' tabloids spotlighted in Trump's hush money trial": https://abcnews.go.com/US/hidden-world-catch-kill-tabloids-spotlighted-trumps-hush/story?id=109528512
5. CNBC: "Federal prosecutors give National Enquirer publisher immunity in Cohen case," December 12, 2018: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/12/12/federal-prosecutors-give-national-enquirer-publisher-immunity.html
Counterarguments and Context
Trump and his legal team consistently argued that the Daniels payment was a private legal settlement made to protect Trump's personal reputation, not a campaign contribution. They contended that personal embarrassment constitutes a non-campaign motivation sufficient to remove the transaction from the scope of the Federal Election Campaign Act. During the 2024 Manhattan criminal trial, defense attorneys argued that non-campaign purposes need not be the sole motivation for a payment to be lawful, a standard they argued the prosecution failed to apply correctly.
Cohen's reliability as a witness was challenged at every stage of the proceedings. Cohen had previously lied to Congress and acknowledged stealing money from the Trump Organization, providing Trump's legal team with credible grounds to attack his testimony. During the 2024 trial, Cohen acknowledged under cross-examination that he harbored personal anger toward Trump following their professional break.
On the AMI side, the defense offered arguments that catch-and-kill is a recognized tabloid practice not inherently illegal. The legal violation identified was not the practice in the abstract but the specific coordination with a federal campaign and the conclusion that the payments' principal purpose was electoral influence, a conclusion AMI itself admitted in writing in its non-prosecution agreement.
Author's Note
This entry documents the underlying catch-and-kill scheme and the federal campaign finance resolutions. This conduct formed the foundational context for the New York State falsifying business records prosecution documented in CRIM-001. The federal admissions by Cohen and AMI, each made under legal obligation, place the core facts of this entry on the Tier 1 evidentiary footing appropriate to the classification. Trump was not separately indicted in the SDNY in connection with these events, but was identified as Individual-1 in Cohen's federal charging documents.