According to two people with direct knowledge of the matter, it was right around this time that Trump started asking White House aides if he should tweet about “the dead girl”—as one of the people recalled the president phrasing it—to get back at his friend-turned-foe “Psycho Joe.” Multiple advisers cautioned against doing so, arguing it was, at the very least, not worth it. For the most part, the president ended up resisting his initial impulses, though he would briefly and vaguely reference the death in a tweet sent months later in November 2017.

While Trump remained mostly silent in public, he was more active behind the scenes. His son-in-law and senior White House adviser asked the National Enquirer to pursue the story.

“Trump through Kushner was begging [Enquirer publisher David] Pecker to do something about Scarborough [and Klausutis’ death],” a person with direct knowledge of the situation told The Daily Beast. “The Enquirer started working on a story at their behest.”