Stormy Daniels Interview Nets 10 Year High In Ratings For "60 Minutes"

Stormy Daniels (via screen capture)

The much-anticipated Stormy Daniels interview with Anderson Cooper on CBS' 60 Minutes was a ratings bonanza for the newsmagazine. Last night's audience of over 23 million was the largest since 2008's interview with Barack and Michelle Obama.

My two big take aways from last night's 60 Minutes interview with Stormy Daniels:

Daniels' revealing the specifics of an actual threat to her brought criminal behavior into this tale of woe.

From Axios:

Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, said an unknown man physically threatened her in 2011 in parking lot with her infant daughter after she granted a tell-all interview to In Touch magazine. Daniels recalled, "I was in a parking lot ... And a guy walked up on me and said to me, 'Leave Trump alone. Forget the story.' And then he leaned around and looked at my daughter and said, 'That’s a beautiful little girl. It'd be a shame if something happened to her mom.' And then he was gone."

Stormy Daniels was threatened by a man who approached her and said “Leave Trump alone. Forget the story. That’s a beautiful little girl. It’d be a shame if something happened to her mom.”#StormyDanielsDay #TrumpSexProbe pic.twitter.com/WeJ3gJlGgd

— Scott Dworkin (@funder) March 26, 2018

The second issue of interest was learning Michael Cohen, Donald Trump's lawyer, may very well be in much more jeopardy for paying the $130,000 to Daniels that he originally thought.

If Cohen's $130,000 payment — which he claims he made personally — actually violates campaign finance laws. Former FEC chairman Trevor Potter spoke to "60 Minutes" about the situation, stating that Cohen could be in trouble if he was never reimbursed by Trump:

If Trump paid Cohen back: "If he was then reimbursed by the president, that doesn't remove the fact that the initial payment violated Cohen's contribution limits. I guess it mitigates it if he's paid back by the candidate because the candidate could have paid for it without limit."

If Trump didn't pay Cohen back: "Then he is still out on the line, having made a illegal in kind contribution to the campaign."

Daniels' lawyer Michael Avenatti producing a FedEx slip from the delivery of the signed NDA to Trump Tower was something. It was incredibly stupid to have the document sent to Trump Tower if keeping Trump out of the equation was the point. Not a biggie, but another slice to add to the pie of evidence.

Other than those bits of info, the much-hyped interview wasn't all that explosive.

Along the way, I do think Stormy knew how to get under the Trumpster's skin by making a point to say she didn't want to have sex with him and insinuating it wasn't all that.

After repeating Trump's alleged offer to try and get her on The Apprentice, I'd love for a reporter to check in with the producers of the show at the time and ask if Stormy Daniels' name ever came up in discussions with Trump.