The Indestructible
Footballguy
I don't think so.Does this action in any jeopardize her legal standing re: claims that the contract is invalid, since she'd be "validating it" with an offer of retraction?
First, Stormy's offer was probably communicated to Cohen/Trump in a letter from Stormy's attorney, which would include language saying that the offer does not waive any of Stormy's rights or constitute an admission of any fact. Also, the offer is likely part of settlement negotiations, and settlement negotiations are not admissible evidence.
Second, her argument is that the agreement is not binding because Trump never signed it, not because she never got paid. You can have a contract by performance, which means that even if the parties didn't sign the paperwork, if they nevertheless behaved as if there were a contract and carried out their obligations, a court will find that there is an enforceable contract. One exception to this is if the contract explicitly says that is is valid only when signed by all the parties. This is usually more of a theoretical defense than anything else because courts generally do whatever they can to find that the parties entered into a valid contract. But here, Stormy's attorneys are arguing that the language of the NDA does require everybody's signature, including Trump's. In this respect, Stormy's offer is more posturing than anything in my mind. There is no way that Trump/Cohen care about getting the 130K back - they just want Stormy to stay quiet. Her attorney is foregrounding the catch-22 for Trump/Cohen: either the NDA is invalid because Trump was a party and didn't sign it, or the NDA is somehow valid and Trump is therefore party to an NDA with a porn star involving a payment that may have violated election laws.