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ASHLYNNE:

From Schwartz Media, I’m Ashlynne McGhee. This is 7am.

As Donald Trump zeroed in on his successful 2016 run to the presidency, he began to engage in what’s called “catch and kill” journalism.

He and his lawyers developed these relationships with tabloid journalists who tracked down damaging stories about Donald Trump, paid for exclusive rights to the stories and then promptly buried them, never publishing a single word.

Today, managing editor of The Saturday Paper Emily Barrett, on the Australian journo who built quite the reputation for catch and kill, and how he’s ended up being named as Donald Trump’s co-conspirator.

It’s Thursday, May 2.

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ASHLYNNE:

Emily, Donald Trump's hush money trial is underway in Manhattan. Remind me, which case is this again?

EMILY:

Okay, so there's a lot that Trump is facing right now. There are four criminal cases against him, and those comprised 91 felony charges. So aside from this one that we've got going on, we've got a federal case before the Supreme Court in D.C., and that's on conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Then there's a Florida court hearing, that has not yet been set, will hear the case of the classified documents that Trump kept at Mar-A-Lago. That's full shots of the bathroom documents. And that's 40 federal charges. And then there's a state case in Georgia, ten charges for allegedly trying to overturn Biden's win in that state. So there's plenty to go on with otherwise. But this one is the one that's likely to come with some kind of resolution before the election. At least the only one that is. So that's the one that everyone is focusing on at the moment.

Audio excerpt – News reporter:

“The case against Donald Trump in New York city over an alleged payment to Stormy Daniels to allegedly buy her silence and keep it from the voters.”

Audio excerpt – Donald Trump:

“They marked it down to a legal expense. This is what I got indicted over. Think of it. I get indicted, I'm leading candidate. I'm beating Biden and beating the Republicans.”

EMILY:

So at the heart of this is a $130,000 payment by Trump's lawyer at the time, Michael Cohen, to a porn star, Stormy Daniels or Stephanie Clifford. It's not so much paying for the story, because that's actually fairly standard procedure for tabloids in the US, it's called catch and kill. It's about the misuse of funds that were intended for the campaign, and they've been redirected into paying off for a cover up, allegedly, of a personal embarrassment for the president, which would influence the outcome of the election. And that's what this turns on.

ASHLYNNE:

And now an Australian journo Dylan Howard has found himself at the centre of it. He was the editor of this tabloid called The National Enquirer, and the judge has just named him Trump’s co-conspirator.

Audio excerpt – 9 News Reporter:

“An Australian journalist was front and centree in the Donald Trump’s hush money trial today, and he has been named as a co-conspirator of the former president. Victorian man Dylan Howard…”

ASHLYNNE:

What do we know about this guy?

EMILY:

So Dylan Howard is an interesting character. He's an interesting character insofar as, you know, he started out as a journalist for the Geelong Advertiser, he's 42 years old now. And he's basically done a lot of sports reporting, in his early career. He later joined Channel 7. And where he really sort of came to public notice there was in a 2007 story that he did, that was about drug use in football. This was based on documents that the network bought from a woman who had apparently found them in a gutter somewhere, they paid thousands of dollars for these documents. The story prompted a police investigation that was into the publication of player's private medical records. Now, Howard was cleared by that investigation, but his contract at Channel 7 wasn't renewed. And then he left the US in 2009.

He's worked in a few places in the US, but started cultivating himself as a gossip columnist and journalist. And he joined this publication Radar Online, which is a part of the American Media Inc stable, of which The National Enquirer is one of those publications.

Audio excerpt – News Reporter:

“Dylan Howard from Radar Online and Star Magazine, and I can not believe I am here today with the most provocative name to show biz news”

EMILY:

Dylan Howard clearly enjoys pieces where he feels he can break a little bit of mystery. And, you know, he's written stories about the real death of Diana, Princess of Wales. Charlie Sheen is one of his favourite topics.

Audio excerpt – News Reporter:

“Radar Online, he was there with Charlie Sheen when the actor took the more comprehensive drug test. Dylan, tell us how all came about exactly what test Charlie was given.”

Audio excerpt – Dylan Howard:

“I confronted him, I asked him whether or not he was prepared to undergo a drug test. He said he would if, when he passed, I would drink his urine, as a way of...”

EMILY:

Perhaps the best way to describe is this that Dylan Howard has, in his desire to create a kind of mystique around his stories, he's looked harder and harder throughout his career, it seems, for ways that he can buy stories.

Audio excerpt – CBS News Reporter:

“It’s getting seemingly worse every day for Mel Gibson. There’s another audio recording which has now been made public, reportedly of him…”

Audio excerpt – News Reporter:

“Posted on Monday by Radaronline.com. In it the actor sounds completely unhinged.”

Audio excerpt – Oksana Grigorieva:

“You need medication.”

Audio excerpt – Mel Gibson:

“I need a woman.”

EMILY:

And, you know, it's all part of this very seedy environment in New York of, you know, which runs from sort of the New York Post and all of these different... Daily Mail, all of these publications that basically will put aliens on the front cover before they'll put anything politically astute.

ASHLYNNE:

Ok, and so how did Dylan Howard then go on to become the editor in chief of The National Enquirer?

EMILY:

In 2014, everyone was chasing this story at the beginning of the year of the death of Philip Seymour Hoffman, the stage actor and movie actor.

Audio excerpt – ABC News Reporter:

“The tragic death of Philip Seymour Hoffman, a performer who was known for his extraordinary range, he was also known for his honesty about the struggles he faced away from the public eye. Tonight investigators at his home after what they believe was a heroin overdose.”

EMILY:

His body was apparently found in his West Village apartment by one of his good friends, David Bar Kartz, who was a playwright. So the search was on among the tabloids to try and find David Katz. It seems that The National Enquirer found David Katz, and they published an exclusive interview with him, in which he talked about his homosexual affair with Philip Seymour Hoffman and of all the drugs they'd taken. And it was a very lurid, very powerful story and obviously interesting for readers. Unfortunately, they didn't have the right David Katz. They had found a TV producer who was working freelance in New Jersey, and he had basically had a bit of fun with all this attention from The National Enquirer. The real David Bar Katz sued American Media Inc. for $50 million, and there was a settlement out of court so we don't know exactly how much it ended up being, but it was certainly enough for David Bar Katz to establish an annual prize for playwrights in Hoffman's honour. So it was a great outcome for him. But, but perhaps not such a great one for the editor at the time of The National Enquirer, who was canned, and Dylan Howard went from running a fairly sort of small sideline part of this massive media staple, into being elevated to what is kind of the top job in this very, very prominent tabloid in New York.

The National Enquirer actually was sold in 2019, and in 2020 Howard's contract was not renewed. He's returned to Australia. His lawyer, John Harris, has said he has a spinal injury that's keeping him from returning to the US to testify, and it has to be said he's not accused of any crime here. But it's certainly the case that, you know, he has been playing a role for quite a while now, as kind of a disruptor. It's just that it's really not entirely clear that tangling with Trump has worked for anybody. And The Enquirer and perhaps Dylan himself at this point, seems to have bitten off a little more than they can chew.

ASHLYNNE:

After the break, the court hears how Trump’s 2016 campaign put Dylan Howard’s skills to use.

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ASHLYNNE:

So Emily, tabloid practices, this chequebook journalism and this Australian editor Dylan Howard, have all become part of the focus at Donald Trump's trial in Manhattan. Tell me about the evidence that the court's heard so far.

EMILY:

Yeah, it's been, it's been fairly wild, actually. The first witness that the prosecution called up was David Pecker. And he's 72 years old, he was the chief executive of American Media until 2020, and he still considers himself a friend of Trump's. He's basically testifying now in order to secure immunity for himself from prosecutors. And he's really the person who has been helping the public understand, I suppose, how tabloids actually really work. And he's very upfront about it. He testified on April 22nd that “we used chequebook journalism and we paid for stories". Now, this goes back to a 2015 meeting between the publisher, David Pecker, and Trump, who was eyeing the Republican nomination at the time, and his lawyer, Michael Cohen. And Pecker offered to be the campaign's eyes and ears, which meant he was looking out for people who wanted to sell damaging stories about Trump so those stories could be bought and suppressed. That's that's a strategy that's known as catch and kill. The person who was going to be those eyes and ears was Dylan Howard. So during the election campaign, Pecker went on to make these deals. First with a former Trump Tower doorman, $30,000 was paid over allegations of a lovechild with an employee. Which turned out to be untrue. They also then made a $150,000 payment to a former Playboy model, Karen McDougal. She alleged a month long affair with Trump in 2006-2007. Trump denied their affair and these deals were also, Pecker says, brokered by Dylan Howard. And they basically paid out these deals so that they could honour Pecker's agreement with Trump. The National Enquirer at the time of the campaign was clearly, sort of, rising to its role and enjoying, you know, being part of the, part of this campaign. And for a paper that might have seen itself on the way out ,was losing circulation was starting to look like it had kind of lost its edge, lost its relevance, this was a real opportunity for Packer to put it back on the national scale and put it back in top of mind for people. And so they had headlines like "Donald Trump, Healthiest Individual Ever Elected”. And they had lots of negative stories, obviously, about Hillary Clinton with photos that were doctored to make her look incredibly ill. And so this was really a tour for the American public of what the tabloid landscape looks like and it's clearly laid the culture pretty bare.

ASHLYNNE:

And so, even though Dylan Howard wasn't in the courtroom, he's back in Australia, can't travel. But we have this kind of raw, firsthand insight into what he was up to at the time, don't we?

EMILY:

Yeah so, some of the texts and emails that have come out of this court case are incredible. So days before the election, when he had already had the discussion with Stormy Daniels about what she wanted from any kind of payment for the story, he wrote to Pecker and said, “I can lock it on publication now, to shut down the media chatter, and we can assess next steps thereafter, okay". Then apparently that was followed by a phone call, and Pecker wasn't too impressed with receiving yet another request for hush money. And particularly since the previous two payments hadn't been paid back by Trump or the organisation as he has pointed out. In his testimony to the trial, Pecker recalled saying, “I'm not a bank. If anyone was going to buy it, I thought Michael Cohen and Donald Trump should buy it.” And so he advised Cohen, who was Trump's lawyer at the time, obviously to pay her and take the story off the market, which Cohen says he then did. There was a follow up text from Dylan Howard saying “Spoke to MC, all sorted, no fingerprints”, which reads pretty badly now. On the night of the election, Howard apparently also texted to Pecker, “at least if he wins, I'll be pardoned for electoral fraud”. So the judge and the prosecutor have ended up naming Dylan Howard as a co-conspirator in this case, and it's unclear what that means for his own career and his own future. But certainly it's possibly a cautionary tale for gossip columnists of his ilk that these things can gain a notoriety that you're not exactly seeking out in the first place.

ASHLYNNE:

And so where's the case up to now, what kind of impact could it have on Donald Trump's candidacy? Because US election is now getting pretty close, isn't it?

EMILY:

Yeah, so the US election is obviously in November of this year and, if convicted, Trump could face four years jail. But he can still run for office if he is convicted. Some states ban felons from state and local offices, but there's no prohibition on federal office. And he's still campaigning, and he's actually using these sort of tales of his persecution in the courts to whip up more anger and more sort of fervour among his supporters.

Audio excerpt – Donald Trump:

“And I don’t know how you can have a trial that is going on right in the middle of an election, not fair, not fair. It’s not fair at all, he knows that too. He’s a democrat judge, he wants to do that because they are all trying to damage Trump as much as possible.”

EMILY:

And so at the same time, he's getting hit with multiple gag orders, which I think he's got ten against him at the moment, because he keeps going out and talking about, you know, basically trash talking the prosecutors and the witnesses, and all of the things he's not supposed to do. So he's a fairly unruly person to be trying to hold to account obviously, we all expected that.

But as far as how this impacts the campaign, it doesn't seem to be doing anything about his personal appeal as the front runner for, certainly for the Republicans and, and possibly still a very strong contender versus Joe Biden. Ultimately, what it probably will come down to is, whether or not voters have the stomach to actually vote for somebody who is either a convicted felon or has 91 counts against them. And there is some evidence to suggest that perhaps that might be a bridge too far for a lot of American voters, but there seems to be no plans whatsoever to try and change the candidate or think about backups or anything like that. Donald Trump is looking pretty unstoppable at this point.

ASHLYNNE:

Thanks so much for your time, Emily.

EMILY:

It's a pleasure. Thanks very much, Ashlynne.

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ASHLYNNE:

Also in the news today…

Following yesterday’s national cabinet, the Albanese government has released details of its new response to the domestic violence crisis.

It’ll fund payments of up to $5000 dollars for women escaping domestic violence, it’s committed to trialling new age restrictions for online pornographic content, and it’s bringing forward plans for stronger online privacy laws.

And,

Foreign minister Penny Wong has refused to confirm or deny new reports that the infamous ‘nest of spies’ that infiltrated Canberra in 2020, was connected to Indian intelligence.

The country of origin of the nest of spies has never been officially revealed, although intelligence officials have spoken publicly about the group as an example of foreign interference in the past.

I’m Ashlynne McGhee, this is 7am. Thanks for listening. We will see you again tomorrow.

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