NEW YORK _ Just weeks before the 2016 election, Fox News was reportedly sitting on a damning story about an extramarital affair involving then-Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and porn star Stormy Daniels.
But, even though the writer of the story had an on-the-record statement from Daniels' manager confirming the sexual encounter, the network pulled it from publication, seemingly without explanation, several people familiar with the matter told CNN.
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, made headlines last week amid reports that Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, paid her $130,000 shortly before the election in exchange for her silence about a sexual encounter she had with Trump in 2006. Trump had been married to his third and current wife, Melania, for almost a year at the time of the alleged tryst.
Clifford has stayed silent on the matter, except for a statement of denial supposedly signed by her and circulated by Cohen saying that the claims are "completely false."
But, since reports about Clifford and Trump first surfaced, it has been revealed that she was in talks with several media outlets about interviews in the months leading up to the alleged hush payment from Cohen.
Diana Falzone, the Fox News writer who obtained a statement from Clifford's manager, was incensed by the network's decision to pull her article in October 2016.
"She had the story and Fox killed it," one of CNN's sources said.
Falzone, an entertainment reporter for Fox News, filed a lawsuit against the network last May alleging gender discrimination. The network has denied her claims and the suit remains ongoing.
Fox News, whose coverage is overwhelmingly pro-Trump, claimed in a statement that the network didn't publish Falzone's story over concerns that its fact-checkers were "unable to verify all of the facts."
But the outlet did not explain why it hasn't used any of Falzone's reporting in recent stories about Clifford and Trump.
Trump and Clifford allegedly had sex in his hotel room when they were both visiting Lake Tahoe in July 2006. Clifford, who was vacationing in the area, posted a photo of her and Trump posing together to her MySpace page at the time.
