New Omarosa tape: Lara Trump tried to buy my silence with campaign job

Maria Puente | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Former WH Aide Says Trump Wants a 'Race War' Former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman is declaring she "will not be silenced" by President Donald Trump, remaining defiant as her public feud with her former boss shifts from a war of words to a possible legal battle. (Aug. 14)

Omarosa Manigault Newman released more secret tapes Thursday, which she says back up her claim that President Donald Trump sought to pay for her silence, and she promised to release more if Trump continues to "challenge" her.

In an interview with MSNBC, she produced four selected clips of a secretly recorded phone conversation with Eric Trump's wife Lara, who is a top official in his re-election campaign.

In the clips, Lara Trump is heard offering to pay Omarosa $15,000 a month for a "flexible" campaign job in exchange for remaining silent about what she saw during her year working at the White House.

She said it was a sign of the "corruption" in the Trump White House, in his family and in his campaign.

"This is just the beginning of the kind of corruption going on in Trumpland, and I am here to blow the whistle," she said.

This was December 2017, Omarosa had just been fired and already stories were appearing that suggested she might be publicly critical, Lara Trump suggested.

"It sounds a little like, obviously, that there are some things you've got in the back pocket to pull out. Clearly, if you come on board the campaign, like, we can't have, we got to ... ," Lara Trump is heard saying.

At that point, Omarosa is heard saying, "Oh, God, no."

"Everything, everybody, positive, right?" Lara Trump says.

Omarosa said she believes she was being told she could say nothing negative about Trump or any of his family in public.

“She made it very clear that if I joined this campaign, I would have to keep quiet,” Omarosa said. "I saw it as an attempt to buy me off and buy my silence and pay me $15,000 to keep my silence." She said she declined the job.

In response, Lara Trump issued a statement later Thursday calling the latest secret tapes a "fraud," according to The Associated Press. She said she called Omarosa with a job offer because the family cared about her and it was before she knew about the alleged "gross violations of ethics and integrity" that White House Chief of Staff John Kelly cited as justification for her firing.

"Woman to woman, I shared a connection with Omarosa as a friend and a campaign sister, and I am absolutely shocked and saddened by her betrayal and violation on a deeply personal level," the president's daughter-in-law said in her statement.

Meanwhile, the president on Thursday tweeted a Republican Party video compilation of multiple interviews in which Omarosa lavishly praised Trump; MSNBC also ran the same compilation.

"Thank you for the kind words Omarosa!," Trump tweeted.

Thank you for the kind words Omarosa! https://t.co/PMmNG6iIsi — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 16, 2018

Omarosa responded to the video compilation on MSNBC with defiance.

"I am not going anywhere, I will not be bullied, I am not intimidated," she said. "I will do whatever I have to do to protect myself."

This latest interview with Omarosa comes as she is continuing her promotional tour for her new tell-all book, "Unhinged," which references this conversation. Details from the book began pouring out even before it was released Tuesday.

The clips she released do not include the entire context of the conversation, but she said she believes they back up what she says in the book.

"I wanted to undergird the book, everything in quotes in there is verified and documented," she said.

During her book tour, Omarosa has shared a series of covert recordings of her conversations with the president, chief of staff Kelly and other senior aides.

In the MSNBC interview, she also hinted she has more tapes and she will make them public "when the time comes."

"Every time they challenge me, I will bring out the receipts," she said.

Late Thursday, one of Trump's lawyers, Charles Harder, sent a letter to Omarosa's publisher, Gallery Books and parent company Simon & Schuster, claiming her book is in violation of a campaign non-disclosure agreement that prohibits her from disclosing "confidential" information or saying anything disparaging about Trump or his family. Omarosa has denied she signed any such agreement.

The publisher responded with a return letter pointing out that any such private NDA can't be used to censor a former government official from speaking out about non-classified matters. The publisher said it is "proceeding as planned with publication of (Omarosa's book), confident that we are acting well within our rights and responsibilities as a publisher," said the statement sent to USA TODAY.

Referring to the president's aggressive push-back in recent days against her, her claims and her book, Melvin asked her on MSNBC about reports that Trump wants Attorney General Jeff Sessions to have her arrested. She said she is unafraid.

"Every act he takes against me jeopardizes him and his presidency," she said. "I don’t have any fear. No matter who is in the Oval Office, Donald Trump needs to remember that God is on his throne."

Omarosa also reiterated the claim she made Tuesday that Trump knew about the hacked Democratic emails obtained by WikiLeaks before they were released during the height of the 2016 election campaign. But she offered no proof of this, and when Melvin pressed her on whether she has talked to special counsel Robert Mueller in connection with his Russia probe, she refused to provide any details.

In a curious detail from her book, Omarosa also discussed in the MSNBC interview her claim that Trump ordered a tanning bed set up in the White House, which he uses every day. She charged that Trump fired chief White House usher Angella Reid – the first woman and second African-American to hold the position – because he was unhappy about how she handled the transportation of the tanning bed to the White House.

Reid was fired in May 2017, but the reasons have never been explained by the White House.

Trump 'Apprentice' slur tapes: A who's who of people associated with alleged recording

More: Did Omarosa break the law by taping her firing in White House Situation Room?