TRUMP ASSAULT ALLEGATIONS
(UNWANTED TOUCHING, KISSING, ETC.)
🎼 THE SCUMBAG BLUES 🎼
Music by Mike Huckabee, on Bass and Sara Huckabee on Live Flute
Donald Trump’s marriage is facing a fresh crisis as a porn star sues him over their alleged sexual affair. Stormy Daniels has issued court proceedings against the US President, saying their non-disclosure agreement is null and void because he did not sign it. The allegations have left the 71-year-old sleeping alone in the White House as ex-model Melania, 47, is said to be contemplating leaving him after 13 years of marriage.
Ms Daniels was paid $130,000 days before the 2016 election by attorney Michael Cohen to ensure she would not speak about her “intimate” relationship with Mr Trump. The porn star, 38, accuses Mr Cohen in court papers of continuing to bully her to keep quiet about the 2006 affair that is said to have begun shortly after Melania gave birth to their son, Barron.
White House sources say the lawsuit has left the First Lady “incandescent with anger” after Ms Daniels’ lawyer confirmed today the relationship was sexual.
When asked whether his client had a sexual relationship with then-businessman Mr Trump, her attorney Michael Avenatti responded “yes”. A source told the Mirror: “Melania is no fool. She is a highly intelligent woman who makes up her own mind. The mounting accusations are taking their toll.” In recent weeks, the First Lady has declined to travel in the same car as the President and refuses to hold his hand when he tries to take hers in public.
Ms Daniels – star of 150 porn films, including Dirty Deeds and Good Will Humping – filed her lawsuit in Los Angeles in her real name, Stephanie Clifford. In it, Mr Avenatti says of the hush agreement: “To be clear, the attempts to intimidate Ms Clifford into silence and ‘shut her up’ in order to ‘protect Mr Trump’ continue unabated.”
REAL LOVING PEOPLE CALLED NAMES BY A SCUMBAG
In Barack and Michelle Obama, America had the marital role models the White House demands. They were the poster couple for marriage. But in Donald and Melania Trump, there are few, if any, signs of harmony in what some now call the Fight House.
The sexual misconduct accusations against the President by more than 22 women would see any other elected world leader in an untenable position. But, even as the allegations of a sexual affair with Stormy Daniels are played out in court, many in America believe Teflon Don will not become unstuck.
The biggest worry is that America, in large part, seems entirely at ease with Trump’s behavior. His chief enablers seem fine with the tawdry reports, including those you would expect it to most deeply offend, such as leading evangelical Christians.
The right-wing Family Research Council says Trump gets “a mulligan” – or second chance – on reports of cheating and other misbehaviors as Evangelicals “were tired of being kicked around by Obama and his leftists”. (How were these Jesus Freaks kicked around by Barack Obama?) All in their sick heads...
Melania could, of course, leave him and take half his assets ( Not with a pre- nuptial agreement) but she knows who she married and you can’t imagine him sleeping with a porn star comes as a huge surprise to her. ( How naive)
It’s just the kind of guy he is. ( A LYING SCUMBAG) When Trump boasted about grabbing women by the p****, he also said, “You can do anything”. When it comes to the Commander-in-Cheat, he may just be right.
RESTRAINING ORDER
President Trump’s lawyer secretly obtained a temporary restraining order last week to prevent a pornographic film star from speaking out about her alleged affair with Mr. Trump, according to legal documents and interviews.
The order, issued by an arbitrator in California and reviewed by The New York Times, pertained to the actress Stephanie Clifford, who had been paid $130,000 shortly before the 2016 election in what she calls a “hush agreement.” In recent weeks, she had prepared to speak publicly about Mr. Trump, claiming his lawyer, Michael D. Cohen, had broken the agreement.
The details of the order emerged on Wednesday after the White House’s spokeswoman, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said that Mr. Trump’s lawyer had won an arbitration proceeding against Ms. Clifford, who goes by the name of Stormy Daniels.
Ms. Sanders’s statement put the White House in the middle of a story that Mr. Trump and his lawyer had been trying to keep quiet for well over a year. The turn of events created the spectacle of a sitting president using legal maneuvers to avoid further scrutiny of salacious accusations of an affair and a payoff involving the porn star.
Although Ms. Clifford said their relationship was consensual, the issue is particularly sensitive to Mr. Trump, whose campaign was dogged by allegations of groping and his boast of grabbing women’s crotches.
Ms. Clifford filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court on Tuesday asserting that the nondisclosure agreement that accompanied the $130,000 payment was void because Mr. Trump never signed it.
Ms. Sanders said that the president had denied having an affair with Ms. Clifford or making the payment himself. She added that she was not aware of whether Mr. Trump knew about the payment to Ms. Clifford at the time.
“I’ve had conversations with the president about this,” Ms. Sanders said. “This case has already been won in arbitration, and there was no knowledge of any payments from the president, and he has denied all these allegations.”
Lawrence S. Rosen, a lawyer representing Mr. Cohen, said in a statement on Wednesday that an arbitrator, who “found that Ms. Clifford had violated the agreement,” barred her from filing her lawsuit and making other disclosures of confidential information.
Ms. Clifford’s lawyer, Michael Avenatti, said that he did not consider the restraining order, dated Feb. 27, valid, and that his client would proceed with her lawsuit in open court. “This should be decided publicly,” he said.
Ms. Clifford’s nondisclosure contract, made public through her lawsuit, calls for disagreements to be settled through confidential, binding arbitration. The lawsuit was filed a week after Mr. Cohen initiated arbitration proceedings, but the court papers did not say what was at issue or refer to the restraining order.
The contract gives Mr. Trump the right to seek financial penalties of more than $1 million in arbitration should Ms. Clifford break or threaten to break her agreement to stay silent. It also gives him the right to obtain an injunction barring her from speaking while disputes are considered in arbitration or open court. Those terms prompted Ms. Clifford to change her plans about going public, according to two people familiar with the situation who were not authorized to speak about it.
Ms. Clifford had suggested she was free to speak out after Mr. Cohen disclosed last month that he had arranged the payment, prompting her to claim that the contract had been breached.
The restraining order took her by surprise. A close friend of Ms. Clifford’s, J. D. Barrale, said in an interview that she learned Mr. Cohen initiated arbitration proceedings when she landed on a flight from Los Angeles to Texas. “She was shocked,” Mr. Barrale said.
Mr. Avenatti said Ms. Clifford had “never even been provided an opportunity to respond” to Mr. Cohen’s action in arbitration.
A copy of the restraining order, obtained by The Times and first reported by NBC News, left open the possibility that it could be modified in the future. But Mr. Avenatti said he questioned its validity because it was brought on behalf of Mr. Cohen, not Mr. Trump.
Asked if Ms. Clifford would drop her court case if Mr. Cohen provided her with more money, he said she would not. “At this point, we are well beyond that — this is a search for the truth,” he said.
The lawsuit by Ms. Clifford adds weight to allegations in a separate legal complaint brought by Common Cause, a public interest group that has asked the Federal Election Commission and the Justice Department to investigate the $130,000 payment by Mr. Cohen. Common Cause argues that the payment amounted to an undeclared in-kind contribution to Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign.
Federal election law requires contributions and expenditures for a campaign to be promptly disclosed, and prohibits a candidate from dipping into campaign funds to cover personal expenses. There is no evidence that campaign money was used to make the payment.
Common Cause filed a similar complaint about a $150,000 payment made shortly before the election by American Media Inc., owner of The National Enquirer, to Karen McDougal, a former Playboy Playmate who has said she had an affair with a married Mr. Trump about a decade ago. The company dismissed the complaint as meritless.
The Enquirer never published a story about the alleged affair, and Common Cause asserts that if the payment was intended to keep Ms. McDougal quiet, it would be an illegal coordinated expenditure by a company on behalf of the Trump campaign.
MORE TENTACLE VICTIMS
NAME: Jessica Leeds -Early 1980s
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Alleges that she sat next to Trump on a flight
ALLEGATION: Leeds told the New York Times that after she was moved into a first-class seat next to his, Trump lifted the armrest, touched her breasts, and "started putting his hand up her skirt." "He was like an octopus," she said. "It was like he had six arms. He was all over the place."
NAME: Ivana Trump 1989
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Wife from 1977 to 1992
ALLEGATION: "After a painful scalp reduction surgery to remove a bald spot, Donald Trump confronted his then-wife, who had previously used the same plastic surgeon. " 'Your f[******] doctor has ruined me!' Trump cried.
"What followed was a 'violent assault,' according to Lost Tycoon. Donald held back Ivana's arms and began to pull out fistfuls of hair from her scalp, as if to mirror the pain he felt from his own operation. He tore off her clothes and unzipped his pants.
" Then he jams his penis inside her for the first time in more than sixteen months. Ivana is terrified... It is a violent assault,' Hurt writes. 'According to versions she repeats to some of her closest confidantes, 'he raped me.'
"Following the incident, Ivana ran upstairs, hid behind a locked door, and remained there 'crying for the rest of night.' When she returned to the master bedroom in the morning, he was there.
After the divorce she dropped the charges, with the amount money she got I don't blame her.
NAME: Kristin Anderson Early 1990s
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Anderson and Trump were at a nightclub in Manhattan on the same night.
ALLEGATION: Anderson says Trump sat next to her on a couch, put his hand up her skirt, and "touched her vagina through her underwear," in the words of the Washington Post's Karen Tumulty, to whom Anderson told her story. She said she pushed his hand away immediately, and that the incident was brief: "less than 30 seconds," as Tumulty wrote. The people at the club with her knew of the incident, and Anderson also said she told friends a few days later.
NAME: Jill Harth 1992
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Business partner
ALLEGATION: The New York Times first published a legal complaint detailing Harth's account in May, but Harth elaborated in an interview with the Times' Nicholas Kristof in October. She said that at dinner one night, Trump put his hands up her skirt, touching her crotch. "He was relentless ... I didn't know how to handle it. I would go away from him and say I have to go to the restroom. It was the escape route," she told Kristof. "He name-dropped continuously," she added in a later lawsuit, "when he wasn't groping me."
"I'm a makeup artist. The guy is a mess, OK? He really needed my services, and I'm a makeup artist that needs a job. Why would, if I was on friendly terms, why wouldn't I try to get that job?"
NAME: Temple Taggart 1997
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Former Miss Utah, 21 in 1997, the first year Trump owned Miss USA.
ALLEGATION: "He kissed me directly on the lips. I thought: 'Oh, my gosh. Gross.' He was married to Marla Maples at the time. I think there were a few other girls that he kissed on the mouth. I was like, Wow, that's inappropriate."
"At the gala celebration after the show, she said, Mr. Trump immediately zeroed in on her, telling her how much he liked her style and inviting her to visit him in New York to talk about her future. Soon enough, she said, he delivered another unwelcome kiss on her lips, this time in Trump Tower."
NAME: Karena Virginia 1998
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Virginia says she was standing outside the U.S. Open when Trump approached her.
ALLEGATION: According to Yahoo! News, the then-27-year-old Virginia was waiting for a ride outside the U.S. Open in 1998. Here is her account of what happened:
"He then walked up to me and reached his right arm and grabbed my right arm. Then his hand touched the right inside of my breast. I was in shock. I flinched. 'Don't you know who I am. Don't you know who I am,' That's what he said to me. I felt intimidated and I felt powerless.
"Then my car pulled up and I got in. ... "
NAME: Mindy McGillivray 2003
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: McGillivray attended a party at Mar-a-Lago in January 2003.
ALLEGATION: McGillivray said Trump touched her buttocks, telling the Palm Beach Post: "All of a sudden I felt a grab, a little nudge. I think it's [my friend Ken Davidoff's] camera bag, that was my first instinct. I turn around and there's Donald. He sort of looked away quickly."
"This was a pretty good nudge. More of a grab. It was pretty close to the center of my butt. I was startled. I jumped."
Davidoff corroborated the story to the Post, saying that immediately after the incident, she told him, "Donald just grabbed my ass!"
NAME: Rachel Crooks 2005
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Was a receptionist at a firm in Trump Tower.
ALLEGATION: She says that immediately after she introduced herself to Trump, he kissed her cheeks, then moved to her mouth. "It was so inappropriate," she told the New York Times. "I was so upset that he thought I was so insignificant that he could do that."
NAME: Natasha Stoynoff December 2005
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Was a People magazine writer in 2005.
ALLEGATION: Stoynoff writes in a piece posted Wednesday night about a 2005 trip she took to Mar-a-Lago to interview Trump and his wife, Melania. During a break, Trump offered to show her around, saying there was one room in particular he wanted her to see. Stoynoff's account describes what happened next as an "attack":
"We walked into that room alone, and Trump shut the door behind us. I turned around, and within seconds, he was pushing me against the wall, and forcing his tongue down my throat. ... I was stunned. And I was grateful when Trump's longtime butler burst into the room a minute later, as I tried to unpin myself."
Later, she writes, Trump said to her, "You know we're going to have an affair, don't you?"NPR has reached out to Stoynoff and People magazine. Stoynoff did not respond, but People said that she is not giving interviews right now.
NAME: Jessica Drake 2006
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Drake met Trump at a golf tournament in Tahoe, Calif.
ALLEGATION: Drake said Trump invited her to his suite after the tournament. Because she did not feel comfortable going alone, she said she brought friends with her to his room. "When we entered the room," Drake daid, "he grabbed each of us tightly in a hug and kissed each one of us without asking permission."
"He said Donald wanted me to come back upstairs to Donald's suite. I indicated I did not wish to return. Then Donald called. He asked me to return to his suite and have dinner with him. He also invited me to a party; I declined. Donald then asked me, 'What do you want? How much?' I told him that I couldn't because I had to return to LA for work. I said that as an excuse because I didn't want him to continue asking me, and I didn't want to be with him.
"After that, I received another call from either Donald, or a male calling on his behalf, offering me $10,000. I declined again and once more gave, as an excuse, that I had to return to Los Angeles for work. I was then told Mr. Trump would allow me to use his private jet only if I accepted his private invitation."
She and attorney Gloria Allred also released a photo of Drake and Trump together.
NAME: Summer Zervos 2007
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Zervos was a contestant on The Apprentice
ALLEGATION: Speaking in a Friday news conference with her attorney, Gloria Allred, Zervos said that Trump kissed her "aggressively" and touched her breast. She said he also led her into the bedroom. After she walked out, he embraced her. She tried to push him away, and he "began thrusting his genitals."
Trump also said Zervos had asked him for help, "asking that I visit her restaurant in California" in April 2016.
NAME: Cassandra Searles 2013
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Was Miss Washington 2013 in the Miss USA pageant
ALLEGATION: According to a June Yahoo News story, Searles wrote a Facebook post decrying Trump's actions as a pageant leader:
"Do y'all remember that one time we had to do our onstage introductions, but this one guy treated us like cattle and made us do it again because we didn't look him in the eyes?
Do you also remember when he then proceeded to have us lined up so he could get a closer look at his property? Oh I forgot to mention that guy will be in the running to become the next President of the United States. I love the idea of having a misogynist as the President.
In the comments section, other contestants agreed with Searles, saying they remembered the experience, Yahoo reported.
Searles also wrote in the comments section, "He probably doesn't want me telling the story about that time he continually grabbed my ass and invited me to his hotel room," according to Yahoo.
NAME: Unnamed woman, friend of CNN anchor Erin Burnett 2010
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Unclear
ALLEGATION: The woman told CNN that she met Trump in a Trump Tower boardroom in 2010. Here is what she told the cable news network:
"Trump took Tic Tacs, suggested I take them also. He then leaned in, catching me off guard, and kissed me almost on lips. I was really freaked out. ... After the meeting
Trump asked me to come into his office alone. Was really unsure what to do. ... Figured I could handle myself. Anyway, once in his office he kept telling me how special I am and gave me his cell, asked me to call him. I ran the hell out of there."
Burnett has referenced this incident multiple times on the air — last week, as well as in a Wednesday night interview. NPR has reached out to CNN, which responded that Burnett "doesn't have anything else to add," and nor does her friend.
NAME: Mariah Billado 1997
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Was Miss Vermont Teen USA in 1997
ALLEGATION: Billado alleged that Trump entered the dressing room while contestants were changing. Billado told BuzzFeed:
"I remember putting on my dress really quick, because I was like, 'Oh my god, there's a man in here.' Trump, she recalled, said something like, 'Don't worry, ladies, I've seen it all before.' "
Billado also recalled telling Ivanka Trump about the incident, telling Buzzfeed that Ivanka responded, "Yeah, he does that."
Four other contestants reached by BuzzFeed said they remembered it, but 11 said they don't remember seeing him in the dressing room.
'Well, I'll tell you the funniest is that before a show, I'll go backstage and everyone's getting dressed, and everything else, and you know, no men are anywhere, and I'm allowed to go in because I'm the owner of the pageant and therefore I'm inspecting it,' Trump said. 'You know, I'm inspecting because I want to make sure that everything is good.'
'You know, the dresses. 'Is everyone okay?' You know, they're standing there with no clothes. 'Is everybody okay?' And you see these incredible looking women, and so, I sort of get away with things like that. But no, I've been very good,' he added."
NAME: Bridget Sullivan 2000
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Was Miss New Hampshire 2000
ALLEGATION: Sullivan told BuzzFeed Trump walked into the dressing room before the pageant:
"While preparing for the national broadcast in 2000, Trump came backstage to wish the contestants good luck, even though many of the women weren't dressed. 'The time that he walked through the dressing rooms was really shocking. We were all naked,' Sullivan said."
However, four other contestants told BuzzFeed they didn't remember this. In addition, several other contestants and one former Miss Universe employee told BuzzFeed of generally positive or neutral experiences with Trump in the same story.
NAME: Tasha Dixon 2001
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Dixon was Miss Arizona 2001
ALLEGATION: "He just came strolling right in. There was no second to put a robe on or any sort of clothing or anything. Some girls were topless, other girls were naked," Dixon told a CBS affiliate in Los Angeles.
"To have the owner come waltzing in when we're naked or half naked in a very physically vulnerable position, and then to have the pressure of the people that work for him telling us to go fawn all over him, go walk up to him, talk to him..." she added.
NAME: Unnamed woman 2001
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: Miss USA contestant in 2001
ALLEGATION: The former contestant declined to be named but told The Guardian that Trump entered the dressing room she shared with another contestant when they were not dressed:
" 'Mr Trump just barged right in, didn't say anything, stood there and stared at us,' she recalled. Trump's attitude, she said, seemed to be: 'I can do this because I can.' " 'He didn't walk in and say, 'Oh, I'm so sorry, I was looking for someone,' she continued. 'He walked in, he stood and he stared. He was doing it because he knew that he could.' "
Another contestant confirmed to The Guardian that the accuser told her about the incident after it happened.
NAME: Unnamed girl 1992
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: The girl was visiting Trump Tower
WHAT HAPPENED: Wednesday night, CBS released video from a 1992 piece shot inside Trump Tower for Entertainment Tonight. The circumstances of the conversation are not clear, but in the video, Trump has a brief exchange with what sounds like a young girl, then comments to a companion:
Trump: You going up the escalator?
Girl: Yeah.
Trump: I'm going to be dating her in 10 years. Can you believe it?
NAME: Two unnamed 14-year-old girls 1992
CONNECTION TO TRUMP: The girls were singing in a youth choir outside the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.
WHAT HAPPENED: The incident is from a brief Chicago Tribune wire story at the time (dug up this week by the Los Angeles Times). Here is the wire story in its entirety:
"Donald Trump turned up Monday for a carol sing by a youth choir outside Manhattan's Plaza Hotel. He asked two of the girls how old they were. After they responded they were 14, Trump said, 'Wow! Just think — in a couple of years I'll be dating you.' "