Michael Avenatti sued Donald Trump for defaming Stormy Daniels against her wishes, Daniels told The Daily Beast in a statement on Wednesday. 
 
 Avenatti also started a new fundraising site to raise money for her legal defense fund without telling her, Daniels said. She said she is not sure whether or not she will keep Avenatti on as her lawyer. 
 
 Here is her full statement, provided to The Daily Beast: 
 
 “For months I’ve asked Michael Avenatti to give me accounting information about the fund my supporters so generously donated to for my safety and legal defense. He has repeatedly ignored those requests. Days ago I demanded again, repeatedly, that he tell me how the money was being spent and how much was left. Instead of answering me, without my permission or even my knowledge Michael launched another crowdfunding campaign to raise money on my behalf. I learned about it on Twitter. 
 
 “I haven’t decided yet what to do about legal representation moving forward. Michael has been a great advocate in many ways. I’m tremendously grateful to him for aggressively representing me in my fight to regain my voice. But in other ways Michael has not treated me with the respect and deference an attorney should show to a client. He has spoken on my behalf without my approval. He filed a defamation case against Donald Trump against my wishes. He repeatedly refused to tell me how my legal defense fund was being spent. Now he has launched a new crowdfunding campaign using my face and name without my permission and attributing words to me that I never wrote or said. I’m deeply grateful to my supporters and they deserve to know their money is being spent responsibly. I don’t want to hurt Michael, but it’s time to set the record straight. The truth has always been my greatest ally. 
 
 “My goal is the same as it has always been—to stand up for myself and take back my voice after being bullied and intimidated by President Trump and his minions. One way or another I’m going to continue in that fight, and I want everyone who has stood by me to know how profoundly grateful I am for their support.” 
 
 “ Michael launched another crowdfunding campaign to raise money on my behalf. I learned about it on Twitter. ” — Stormy Daniels 
 
 The Daily Beast shared this statement with Avenatti. He provided the following statement: 
 
 “I am and have always been Stormy’s biggest champion. I have personally sacrificed an enormous amount of money, time and energy toward assisting her because I believe in her. I have always been an open book with Stormy as to all aspects of her cases and she knows that. The retention agreement Stormy signed back in February provided that she would pay me $100.00 and that any and all other monies raised via a legal fund would go toward my legal fees and costs. Instead, the vast majority of the money raised has gone toward her security expenses and similar other expenses. The most recent campaign was simply a refresh of the prior campaign, designed to help defray some of Stormy’s expenses.” 
 
 Stephen Gillers, a New York University Law School professor and expert on legal ethics, said Avenatti could face serious problems if he sued Trump against Daniels’ wishes. 
 
 “If he filed the case with her name when it was clear that she told him not to, then he could be sued for that,” Gillers said. “He could be sued for malpractice. If true, she has a malpractice case against him. I emphasize if true. And if true, he would be subject to discipline but not as serious as disbarment.” 
 
 The current CrowdJustice site is one of just three fundraisers highlighted on CrowdJustice’s homepage as of Wednesday afternoon. An earlier CrowdJustice site raised more than $580,000 for Daniels’ legal defense and no longer accepts contributions. 
 
 When The Daily Beast contacted Avenatti on Tuesday and asked about Daniels’ two active Crowdjustice sites, the lawyer said, “We reset the page as the focus of the case changed from when we first launched the site.” The Daily Beast also asked on Tuesday for a breakdown of expenses. In response, Avenatti said via email, “The money has gone toward the areas identified on the page. For instance, Stormy's security detail has cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, especially due to the high level of death threats. The other out-of-pocket costs of the litigation are also extraordinary (and I'm not speaking of attorneys' fees). Trump and Cohen have spent millions in their defense].” 
 
 Avenatti claimed at the time that he hasn’t “received a dime in attorneys’ fees” from the crowdfunding effort. He said his firm has “spent well over a thousand hours of attorney time on the case at a value of over $1,500,000 (and no, we do not count interviews or media as attorney time).” 
 
 Avenatti’s legal work for Daniels hasn’t always succeeded. In the April defamation lawsuit against the president, Avenatti argued Trump hurt her by tweeting that she participated in a “total con job.” But in November, a judge dismissed the suit and ordered Daniels to pay the president’s legal bills. Trump’s lawyers asked for almost $350,000 in legal fees; Daniels is now fighting to try to lower that bill. 
 
 Daniels and her lawyer have become household names since the revelation that Michael Cohen—then Trump’s personal attorney—paid her hush-money during the presidential campaign. Daniels says she had an affair with Trump years before he ran for office (a claim Trump denies), and accepted $130,000 from Cohen to stay quiet. 
 
 “ It’s time to set the record straight. The truth has always been my greatest ally. ” — Stormy Daniels 
 
 Cohen admitted in court in August that he made illegal payments during the campaign at Trump’s direction. He pleaded guilty to eight criminal counts and is awaiting sentencing. 
 
 Avenatti, meanwhile, has become a darling of the #Resistance, traveling to Iowa, raising money for Democratic candidates, and openly touting a potential 2020 presidential bid. But his White House dreams have faced major challenges; earlier this month, he was arrested under suspicion of domestic violence—allegations he roundly denies. And when he represented migrant children whom the Trump administration separated from their parents earlier this year, long-time immigration lawyers told The Observer he was “fantastically irresponsible.” 
 
 And as The Daily Beast reported in October, court records reveal that the lawyer and his companies owed millions to the IRS in unpaid taxes and judgments. ||||| The pornographic film actress Stephanie Clifford moved on Wednesday to distance herself from the lawyer Michael Avenatti, saying he had filed a defamation suit against President Trump against her wishes and sometimes spoke on her behalf without her consent. 
 
 In a statement provided to The Daily Beast, Ms. Clifford, who is known professionally as Stormy Daniels, alleged that Mr. Avenatti had also repeatedly ignored her requests for accounting information about a legal defense and safety fund that has drawn support from donors; in the meantime, she said, Mr. Avenatti launched another crowdfunding campaign without her knowledge, attributing words to her that she never wrote or said. 
 
 “I haven’t decided yet what to do about legal representation moving forward,” Ms. Clifford said in her statement to The Daily Beast. “Michael has been a great advocate in many ways. I’m tremendously grateful to him for aggressively representing me in my fight to regain my voice. But in other ways Michael has not treated me with the respect and deference an attorney should show to a client.” 
 
 “I don’t want to hurt Michael, but it’s time to set the record straight,” her statement continued. “The truth has always been my greatest ally.” ||||| Stormy Daniels sets up crowdfunding account to raise funds for Donald Trump legal fight 
 
 Adult film star and director Stormy Daniels has set up a crowdfunding account to raise funds for her legal fees in her fight to void the non-disclosure agreement that she signed connected to her alleged relationship with Donald Trump. 
 
 Daniels, real name Stephanie Clifford, wrote in the tout at website CrowdJustice that she is working to "speak honestly and openly to the American people about my relationship with now President Donald Trump." 
 
 RELATED: Stormy Daniels would like to erase the last few months 
 
 On Wednesday Daniels' assistant confirmed to Chron.com that the crowdfunding account was legitimate. 
 
 "In order to tell my story, I have had to file a public lawsuit in Los Angeles, California in an effort to void a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) that Mr. Trump never signed and yet is trying to use to intimidate me," Daniels added. 
 
 So far she has raised nearly $120,000 in contributions, with some chipping in just $10 to support her cause. 
 
 Last week she filed a lawsuit saying that Trump and his attorney Michael Cohen "aggressively sought to silence" her when she planned to make her story public in late 2016. 
 
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 Her lawsuit seeks to nullify the s0-called "Hush Agreement" that Cohen had Daniels sign soon before the election on the grounds that Trump never signed it himself. 
 
 On Thursday Chron.com briefly spoke to her attorney, Michael Avenatti, about the account. 
 
 "We want a forum for her to tell her story to the American people, without a threat of being sued for millions of dollars," Avenatti told Chron.com. 
 
 Avenatti did say that the public can expect more to come out regarding the case. When asked what those additional details could be he declined to elaborate. 
 
 On Thursday Chron.com was not able to confirm how much money is needed to be raised. 
 
 Some have asked Avenatti what will happen to any excess funds collected from the CrowdJustice account. According to Avenatti it will be refunded to the contributors as pursuant to the website's existing policies. 
 
 RELATED: Read porn star Stormy Daniels' lawsuit against President Donald Trump 
 
 CrowdJustice is a crowdfunding site, quite like GoFundMe or Kickstarter, where everyday people can raise funds for specific legal actions. It has raised thousands of dollars for a variety of causes including voting rights, child refugee appeals, and murder cases. 
 
 Daniels was thrust into the spotlight back in January when the Wall Street Journal reported that Cohen had paid her $130,000 to keep her quiet about the alleged sexual encounter with Trump back in July 2006 at a Lake Tahoe celebrity golf tournament. 
 
 She has offered to return that sum of money in exchange for being able to tell the truth publicly. She wrote on CrowdJustice that neither Trump or his lawyer responded to her offer. 
 
 "I am more fortunate than many, many people in this country. And for that I am grateful. But unfortunately, I do not have the vast resources to fight Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen alone," she wrote. 
 
 The 38-year-old porn performer, director, and screenwriter was recently in Houston where she performed for three nights at Galleria-area club Vivid Live. 
 
 Daniels, the married mother of a 7-year-old metal-music-loving daughter, splits her time between Los Angeles and Dallas when she's not feature dancing or directing her own films. She writes, directs and performs in at least one full-length porn feature a month, on average. 
 
 Craig Hlavaty is a reporter for Chron.com and HoustonChronicle.com.
– Stormy Daniels is again making serious public allegations, but this time they're against her own attorney. In a statement to the Daily Beast, Daniels goes after Michael Avenatti on two main fronts. The biggest beef is about money, specifically the cash raised for Daniels on a crowdfunding site. She alleges that Avenatti refuses to provide details of how the money is being spent even after her repeated demands. "Instead of answering me, without my permission or even my knowledge Michael launched another crowdfunding campaign to raise money on my behalf," she wrote. "I learned about it on Twitter." Avenatti insists that everything is aboveboard, with the money going toward legal fees as agreed, but another allegation made by Daniels might be more damaging for him. In her statement, Daniels alleges that Avenatti filed a defamation suit against President Trump in her name but against her wishes. (A judge ended up tossing the suit.) "If he filed the case with her name when it was clear that she told him not to, then he could be sued for that," New York University Law School prof Stephen Gillers tells the DB. "If true, she has a malpractice case against him. I emphasize if true." As of now, Daniels is still represented by Avenatti, though she says she's considering whether to sever ties. Avenatti, meanwhile, still has two other suits against Trump pending, notes the New York Times. (The attorney faced negative headlines earlier this month on a different matter.)