Karen McDougal Finally Opens Up About Affair with Donald Trump

Introducing Endless Mode: A New Games & Anime Site from Paste

Read our announcement | See the 10 Best Games of 2025 (So Far)

Former Playboy model Karen McDougal sat down with Anderson Cooper to open up about her intimate relationship with Donald Trump this Thursday. The affair occurred over a decade ago in 2006, and it reportedly lasted for 10 months. The two had been corresponding for a while before he invited her to dinner with him at the Beverly Hills Hotel for their first date. The two were intimate and towards the end of their evening Donald Trump tried to pay her. McDougal said she told Trump, “That’s not me. I’m not that kind of girl.”

The interview marks McDougal’s first television appearance since she filed a lawsuit earlier this week against American Media Inc., the company that owns The National Enquirer, which is the company who bought the story from her. The Wall Street Journal published a story that said American Media Inc. paid $150,000 to McDougal, but did not run her story. The contract, according to TWSJ, did not require the Enquirer to run the story, effectively saving Trump and therefore forcing McDougal’s silence.

A rep from American Media Inc. said in response to McDougal’s suit that she, “has been free to respond to press inquiries about her relationship with President Trump since 2016” and that they had not “silenced” her. McDougal denies that she was trying to profit off of this story. “I’m not telling the nitty gritty details, as you can see. I’m very selective in what I’m saying about our relationship. I’m not out to make money on this. I’m out to get my rights back, to prove a contract was illegal, that I was taken advantage of and go back to my life. Period,” McDougal says on her motives to come forward about her truth.

Most Popular

The White House officially said Trump denies the alleged affair. McDougal said on Trump’s denial, “I guess I understand because he’s trying to protect his family, his image, things like that. But it was definitely a little like, ‘Wow, you’re going to lie about that?’”

On ending the affair, McDougal said it was her guilt that really led her to end it. “I was just feeling so guilty, she said. “It was just digging inside me.” She talks about the time Trump gave her a tour of his New York City apartment and on being shown Melania’s room saying, “I just couldn’t wait to get out of the apartment.” When she met Melania at a party for The Apprentice, she reveals she just tried to keep her distance and that the guilt was really troubling her.

On discussing the affair as a whole, McDougal confirms that it was consensual and a very loving relationship. They saw each other regularly, “I can tell you we saw each other a minimum five times a month, up to bigger numbers per month,” she said. She continues to say how she thought she was the only one and did not know about any of the others. Recently adult film star Stormy Daniels, legal name Stephanie Clifford, has gone to court to break silence about her affair with Trump around the same time.

Enjoy the hour long interview with Cooper in the link here.