Stormy Daniels’ stripper skills may save the day

I know I am not the only one rooting for Stormy Daniels to take down Donald Trump. Who better to expose the corruption, manipulation and plain bad manners underpinning our president than a stripper and porn star?

Daniels has the skill set to go toe-to-toe with Trump, because no one can work over 20 years in the sex industry without learning how to set boundaries, manage obnoxious customers and keep her spirits high.

She is undaunted by trolls, reporters, politicians and lawyers insulting her reputation — an exotic dancer hears those kinds of slurs almost daily. Daniels’ experiences stripping help, rather than hinder, her successes in negotiating the ongoing saga of hush money, lawsuits, raids, threats and arrests unfolding in the public eye of this case.

Daniels does not fit comfortably into being a face of the “resistance.”

Born Stephanie Clifford, she is a gun-owning, registered Republican, although she hastily adds that she is socially liberal. Daniels began her career in the sex industry working as a stripper at 17. She received full scholarships to Mississippi State and Texas A&M universities, but instead chose to strip. Daniels branched out into pornography in 2002, working in front of and behind the camera as a director, writer, producer and performer.

So, why is Daniels suing Trump?

In an exclusive interview with In Touch Weekly, conducted in 2011 and preceded by a polygraph test, Daniels shared that she first met Trump at a charity golf tournament in 2006. Trump invited her to dinner that very night. Daniels arrived at his hotel, dressed to the nines, expecting a fancy evening out. Instead, security escorted her to the penthouse suite, and Daniels found Trump “sprawled out on the couch” in his pajama pants. The two shared a meal and friendly banter.

As the evening was winding up, Daniels emerged from the bathroom to see Trump beckoning her to bed, and she said her heart sank. I expect this was partly because she hoped that Trump had seen her as a fellow businessperson, and not just a sex object. They had consensual (if reluctant on Daniels’ part), short, tepid, “normal person” intercourse, she said. Her major concern through this unpleasant, pedestrian encounter was that he not pay her. She might be a porn star and a feature stripper, but not a prostitute — no matter how often others confuse the roles and disparage her work.

The two stayed in touch mostly by text and phone calls for the next year or so in what she called an “ongoing relationship.” Their interactions largely centered on Trump’s promise to get her an appearance on “The Apprentice,” something that he never delivered.

A friend warned Daniels that Trump “thinks really lowly of girls who” work in the sex industry and repeated some awfully vulgar and unprintable comments Trump had made about another entertainer. Daniels felt it was hypocritical of Trump to privately be friends with someone in the business while publicly bashing them. In Touch chose not to publish the 2011 interview until 2018, when the story had broken about Daniels’ relationship with Trump due to Trump’s attorney, Michael Cohen, threatening to sue the magazine.

Daniels has repeatedly said that she is tired of being bullied by Trump and his associates. The threats started in 2011, when a strange man approached Daniels in a Las Vegas parking lot while she was untangling her infant daughter from an unwieldy car seat. He said, “Leave Trump alone. Forget the story.” Then he leaned into the car to peer at Daniels’ baby girl continuing, “That’s a beautiful girl. It’d be a shame if anything happened to her mom.” In addition to this disturbing encounter, since taking on Trump, Daniels has received hate mail and death threats.

Some are calling Daniels a feminist hero. Feminists share three common beliefs: that patriarchy exists, a commitment to gender equality, and women’s rights to bodily autonomy. Daniels’ story illustrates all three of these.

As we watch Republicans in Congress refuse to intervene to stem the worst oppressions of the Trump administration it is a small consolation that at least Stormy Daniels is sticking up for herself and, in doing so, sticking up for America too.