Attorney Michael Avenatti is demanding his former client Stormy Daniels pay up for all of his excellent representation over the years. He claims she owes him $2 million for all of his hard work. From NBC News:

Avenatti, who represented the adult film actress in legal action against Donald Trump, filed a lien claim in an Ohio federal court Wednesday that says Daniels owes him more than $2,000,000 for legal services, costs and expenses… In his lien filing, Avenatti said, “Despite repeated demands that Ms. Daniels fulfill her contractual obligations and pay for the millions of dollars in legal fees and costs she has enjoyed for her benefit over the last approximate 19 months, including in this case, she has refused.”

The Daily Beast has more about the sad state of Michael Avenatti:

Avenatti’s lawsuit this week alleges the initial February 2018 retainer agreement he made with Daniels was for “$100 up-front payment,” prompting his firm to spend “thousands of attorney and staff hours, and a significant out-of-pocket-expenses.” During his retention, Avenatti said he bailed Daniels out of jail “following her arrest in Columbus Ohio in July 2018” after a strip-club brawl and led the “successful efforts” to have the charges dropped. “Despite the significance of his work, Ms. Daniels has yet to directly pay a single dollar to Mr. Avenatti or Avenatti & Associates, APC for their legal services beyond the $100.00 she initially paid back in 2018,” the suit states. “Ms. Daniels is required to pay her lawyers.”

Avenatti never complained about the money back when he was appearing on CNN and MSNBC once or twice a day for months on end. If you could add up the value of all that media time it would surely exceed $2 million. But, alas, Avenatti has fallen on hard times. In March he was arrested and charged with attempting to extort $25 million from Nike. Then in April he was hit with a 36-count indictment in California which accused him of embezzling money from a settlement paid to a disabled client. In May there were reports that he was about to be charged for embezzling $300k from Stormy Daniels. And in June the California State Bar moved to suspend his law license.

As a result of all of this, the poor man has lost his Ferrari and his private jet. This is really a sad story, I guess. And yet, somehow I don’t feel bad about any of it. I think Glenn Greenwald sums up “Resistance dreamboat” Avenatti’s latest claim pretty well here: