Stormy Daniels’s attorney, Michael Avenatti, said on Wednesday that the decision by Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen to invoke his Fifth Amendment rights in Daniels’s lawsuit against him was “stunning.” 
 
 “This is a stunning development. Never before in our nation’s history has the attorney for the sitting President invoked the 5th Amend in connection with issues surrounding the President,” Avenatti wrote on Twitter. 
 
 This is a stunning development. Never before in our nation’s history has the attorney for the sitting President invoked the 5th Amend in connection with issues surrounding the President. It is esp. stunning seeing as MC served as the “fixer” for Mr. Trump for over 10 yrs. #basta — Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) April 25, 2018 
 
 Avenatti, who earlier this month predicted that Cohen would plead the Fifth, said Cohen’s action was especially stunning given that he had served as the president’s “fixer” for more than 10 years. 
 
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 “Based on the advice of counsel, I will assert my 5th amendment rights in connection with all proceedings in this case due to the ongoing criminal investigation by the FBI and U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York,” Cohen said in a court filing Wednesday. 
 
 Cohen said he decided to plead the Fifth based on the FBI raid of his office and hotel room earlier this month and the criminal probe the raid was a part of. 
 
 During the 2016 presidential election, Trump said pleading the Fifth Amendment was a sign that someone wasn't innocent. 
 
 Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, is suing Cohen for defamation over his suggestion that Daniels lied about her alleged affair with Trump. 
 
 Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 as part of a nondisclosure agreement weeks before the election that, Daniels says, was meant to silence her about the reported affair. ||||| A federal judge on Friday granted Michael Cohen’s request for a delay in a lawsuit brought against him by porn star Stormy Daniels, saying it appeared likely Cohen will be indicted in a related criminal investigation. 
 
 Judge S. James Otero’s order for a 90-day stay comes two days after Cohen, President Trump’s personal attorney, said he would invoke his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself in the lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court of the Central District of California. Cohen’s declaration cited the investigation by federal prosecutors in New York, who are examining his role in quashing embarrassing stories about Trump during the 2016 campaign, according to a person familiar with the matter. 
 
 Otero said Friday that the issues in the civil dispute with Daniels overlap with the criminal probe into Cohen. The lawyer’s Manhattan office and home were raided on April 9. 
 
 “This is no simple criminal investigation; it is an investigation into the personal attorney of a sitting President regarding documents that might be subject to the attorney client privilege,” Otero wrote. “Whether or not an indictment is forthcoming, and the Court thinks it likely based on these facts alone, these unique circumstances counsel in favor of stay.” 
 
 Daniels’s attorney, Michael Avenatti, said he planned to file an appeal early next week. 
 
 “While we certainly respect Judge Otero’s 90-day stay order based on Mr. Cohen’s pleading of the 5th, we do not agree with it,” he wrote on Twitter. 
 
 Cohen’s attorney, Brent Blakely, did not respond to a message seeking comment. 
 
 Daniels, who says she had an affair with Trump more than a decade ago, is seeking to void a deal she reached with Cohen days before the election under which she was paid $130,000 in exchange for her silence. Cohen has said he “facilitated” the payment using his own money from a home-equity line of credit. 
 
 Trump, who previously denied knowing anything about the $130,000 arranged by Cohen, acknowledged Cohen’s efforts on Thursday for the first time. 
 
 “Michael represents me, like with this crazy Stormy Daniels deal, he represented me,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News. “And from what I’ve seen, he did absolutely nothing wrong. There were no campaign funds going into this.” 
 
 Daniels’s suit, filed last month, named the president and Essential Consultants, a limited liability company Cohen created as a vehicle for the payment, as defendants. Daniels later added Cohen as a defendant. 
 
 It is not uncommon for defendants facing both civil liability and criminal prosecution to request a pause in civil proceedings to avoid giving sworn testimony and producing documents that could prove incriminating. ||||| Adult-film star Stormy Daniels has filed a defamation suit against President Trump Donald John TrumpEx-Russia ambassador: Trump has done more damage to NATO in months than Russia has in decades Trump takes credit for increased defense spending by NATO allies, but says 'it isn't nearly enough' Trump questions how Russia probe can 'proceed' given FBI agent's private comments MORE in addition to her ongoing one against his personal attorney, Michael Cohen. 
 
 Daniels's lawyer, Michael Avenatti, tweeted Monday that his client has filed the lawsuit for Trump's "irresponsible and defamatory statements" about Daniels, whom Cohen paid $130,000 as part of a nondisclosure agreement weeks before the 2016 election. 
 
 The complaint alleges that Trump's tweets mocking Daniels over a forensic sketch of a man she says threatened her to keep quiet about her claims of an affair with the president amount to defamation because they accuse her of fabricating the alleged crime, which would itself be illegal. 
 
 Moments ago, we filed this lawsuit against Mr. Trump for his recent irresponsible and defamatory statements about my client @stormydaniels. He is well aware of what transpired and his complicity. We fully intend on bringing it to light. #buckleup #bastahttps://t.co/ZuBjI1EY9z — Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) April 30, 2018 
 
 Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, is seeking damages in excess of $75,000, claiming that in posting the tweets, Trump knew that Daniels "would be subjected to threats of violence, economic harm, and reputational damage." 
 
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 Daniels claimed in a “60 Minutes” interview last month that in 2011 a man approached her and her infant daughter in a parking lot and threatened her not to speak about the alleged affair. 
 
 “He leaned around and looked at my daughter and said, 'That’s a beautiful little girl,' ” Daniels said. “ 'It'd be a shame if something happened to her mom.' And then he was gone.” 
 
 In response to the forensic sketch Daniels released, Trump tweeted that the situation was “a total con job,” and shared a tweet that compared the sketch to a photo of Daniels’s ex-husband, suggesting that the two are the same person. 
 
 A sketch years later about a nonexistent man. A total con job, playing the Fake News Media for Fools (but they know it)! https://t.co/9Is7mHBFda — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 18, 2018 
 
 Cohen has requested and on Friday received a 90-day stay in Daniels's lawsuit against him, following the FBI raids on his office, home and hotel room earlier this month. 
 
 Last week, Cohen invoked his Fifth Amendment rights in the suit, saying he could not effectively defend himself because it might incriminate him in the federal case. 
 
 The FBI raids included documents related to the $130,000 payment, among other issues. They came in part from a referral from special counsel Robert Mueller Robert Swan MuellerSasse: US should applaud choice of Mueller to lead Russia probe MORE, though the case against Cohen is reportedly not directly related to the probe into Russia's election interference. 
 
 Cohen is reportedly under investigation for campaign finance and bank fraud violations.
– In what Stormy Daniels' lawyer called a "stunning development," President Trump's personal lawyer said Wednesday that he plans to invoke his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself in the adult film star's lawsuit against him. Michael Cohen, citing government raids on his home and offices, filed papers saying he plans to plead the Fifth in connection with the civil lawsuit "due to the ongoing criminal investigation by the FBI and US Attorney for the Southern District of New York," CNN reports. Daniels is suing Cohen for defamation for accusing her of lying about her alleged affair with Trump, reports the Hill. She is also seeking to void a deal in which Cohen paid her $130,000 to stay quiet about the alleged affair. Michael Avenatti, Daniels' attorney, says the move is especially stunning because Cohen was Trump's "fixer" for more than a decade. "Never before in our nation’s history has the attorney for the sitting President invoked the 5th Amend in connection with issues surrounding the President," he tweeted. He also tweeted a link to a Washington Post story that noted Trump slammed Hillary Clinton staffers in 2016 for invoking the Fifth during the investigation of her email server—but invoked the amendment himself during his 1990 divorce from Ivana Trump, dodging no fewer than 97 deposition questions, mostly about other women. (Avenatti has filed a motion to depose Trump.)