According to persistent though unconfirmed rumors from the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump and TV journalist Tamron Hall had an affair, leading to Hall’s pregnancy and an abortion Trump paid for. We Got This Covered has not independently verified any of this purported information, but here’s a closer look at the “evidence” for the officially unsubstantiated rumor.
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The rumored affair allegedly started a few years before Trump announced his candidacy in 2015. At that time, Hall was an NBC anchor, and Trump, who married Melania in 2005, had contracts with NBC for beauty pageants and The Apprentice, the reality TV competition series he hosted. Trump and Hall presumably knew each other in those contexts. Hall did interview Trump several times, and she served as a Miss Universe judge in 2010.
The “Gawker” voicemail messages
via Pamela Barrera/YouTube
Five years later, Trump was running for president when NBC cut ties with him because of his offensive statements about immigration. But as a journalist, Hall interviewed candidate Trump the next year, and that same year, 4Chan hacked what were alleged to be Trump’s voicemails and gave them to Gawker. In one 2012 message, available to hear on YouTube, a woman who identifies herself as “T. Hall,” which, according to this conspiracy theory-adjacent rumor, refers to the journalist, says the following:
“I had a meeting with Matt today and it could not have gone better. He was so supportive and caring and it was great. So, I’m happy I took your advice.” The voice then says she celebrated by going to “Gucci” and using Trump’s discount to get a dress. Further hacked voicemail messages from the woman identifying herself as “T. Hall” suggested a close — if tense — relationship over Trump’s rightward turn in politics.
Hall’s NBC exit
last Wednesday, when the reporter called Trump to ask if he impregnated Tamron Hall and paid for her abortion, was the day various MAGA grifters were telling their followers to brace for a hit piece pic.twitter.com/AJwLAdXwvE
After Trump’s 2016 win on an anti-abortion platform, rumors were still floating around that he had paid for women’s abortions, but presumably nobody came forward, as these allegations were never proven. Slate published a story that year headlined “Do You Have Information About Abortions Trump May Have Paid For? Let Us Know,” but Hall is not mentioned.
In 2017, Hall left NBC for reasons never fully explained, but some have speculated without official confirmation that it was over her ties to Trump. (Megyn Kelly took Hall’s place as a Today co-anchor. Kelly remains an unspoken Trump supporter). Regarding Hall’s exit, a unnamed source alleged to People that year, “Just a few days before all of this happened, she received an email [from an exec] congratulating the team for being number one. Then all of a sudden, it was like it vanished: Megyn Kelly is coming on board, and who’s going to have to move? Tamron. That’s who.”
By 2019, Hall signed with ABC for her new show, Tamron Hall, and Hall has rarely mentioned Trump by name since — suggesting to some onlookers that there may a non-disclosure agreement in play — save one case in which she said “Trump” rather than “the president” or the “president of the United in States” in an interview with Facebook COO Sheryl Sanberg. Despite covering politics, Hall has not used Trump’s name since then.
According to online journalist J.K. Trotter from rumor site Interesting Mysteries, who has covered Hall’s abortion rumor extensively, no one involved has ever commented or confirmed the story.
According to Trotter, emails sent to Trump’s presidential campaign, including the Protonmail address of chief spokesman Steven Cheung, went unreturned. “In the course of my reporting, I obtained Trump’s personal cell phone number,” Trotter wrote, “which I called on Wednesday night. Trump answered. After I introduced myself and said I was writing about his history with Hall, he immediately disconnected the call.” So take that for what it’s worth, which is hopefully with a mine’s worth of salt.
