Hope Hicks Had a Little Chat With Prosecutors About Trump’s Hush Money Payment

Over the weekend, Donald Trump told reporters at the Conservative Political Action Conference that he would “absolutely” not drop out of the 2024 presidential race if he were hit with criminal charges from one of the many investigations into his conduct. “I wouldn’t even think about leaving,” he said on Saturday, adding that an indictment (or two, or three) would “probably…enhance my numbers.” However, he did not claim that he would be okay if one of his longtime aides and a person he appears to have once thought of as something of a surrogate daughter were to help prosecutors make their case against him. And unfortunately for the ex-president, that may not be up to him!

The New York Times reports that Hope Hicks—a former senior counselor to Trump whom he’s affectionately referred to as “Hopey” and “Hopester”—met with the Manhattan district attorney’s office this week, making her “the latest in a string of witnesses to be questioned by prosecutors as they investigate the former president’s involvement in paying hush money” to porn star Stormy Daniels. According to the outlet, Hicks is “at least the seventh witness” to meet with prosecutors since DA Alvin Bragg convened a grand jury earlier this year to hear evidence in the case. Others have reportedly included former adviser Kellyanne Conway; two Trump Organization employees; and David Pecker, the former head of the publisher of The National Enquirer. Pecker’s testimony was presumably of interest because he’d struck a 2015 agreement, in his capacity as CEO of American Media Inc., to watch out for potentially damaging stories about Trump and ensure they never saw the light of day—but after paying paying $150,000 to keep Playboy model Karen McDougal quiet, he refused to shell out the money for Daniels’s story, and told Team Trump they’d have to deal with her directly.

As for Hicks, while we obviously don’t know the details of her conversation—or whether she testified before the grand jury or simply met with prosecutors—she too may have had some notable tidbits to share. Per the Times:

As the spokeswoman for Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign, Ms. Hicks was responsible for damage control on a number of issues, a role that has attracted the interest of various investigators over the years. In court records from [former Trump attorney Michael] Cohen’s federal case, the F.B.I. noted that she participated in a phone call with Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen on the same day they learned that Ms. Daniels wanted money for her story. Ms. Hicks also spoke with Mr. Cohen the day after he wired the $130,000 to Ms. Daniels’s lawyer.

Prosecutors are likely to want to know whether she was privy to any conversations or other information about Mr. Cohen’s dealings with Ms. Daniels’s representatives or how the hush money payment was arranged.

If you’ll recall, Trump reimbursed Cohen the $130,000 after he took office. And Cohen—who went to prison for, among other things, the hush money deal—has said he arranged the payments at Trump’s direction. (Cohen has also said he expects to testify before the grand jury “very soon.”) Robert Trout, a lawyer for Hicks, did not respond to the Times’s request for comment.

Should Hicks actually be of use to prosecutors in making the case against Trump, it wouldn’t be the first time in recent memory the “Hopester” offered unflattering insight into her former boss. In a deposition shown to the January 6 committee, which the panel aired during its final public hearing, Hicks said she urged Trump to tell his followers that anyone coming to Washington to protest the election should not engage in violence—a recommendation that was, of course, rejected. “It was my view that it was important that the president put out some kind of message in advance of the event,” she said, adding that another senior adviser had given the same advice but was also rebuffed.