More women pour gasoline on the raging Trumpster fire
Hey, there’s good news for Donald Trump. No women have come forward to accuse of him of physical assault since 10:30 last night.
As I write this, that’s an 11-hour moratorium! But I doubt it will last long. The spineless Republicans who keep supporting him (until they don’t; until they do again) might want to ponder once and for all whether it’s worth selling their souls just to win one for the Groper. Especially since he’s just 26 days away from being tagged forevermore as a humiliated loser.
Remember his Sunday night exchange with Anderson Cooper? He said that his “p—y” boasting was just talk, that he has never grabbed women without their consent. Cooper followed up, just to make sure: “Have you ever done those things?” And he replied: “I will tell you. No, I have not.”
You just knew that would come back to haunt him. Within a few hours last night, the serial liar was busted by four new women, all of whom went on record:
Jessica Leeds, now a retired businesswoman, says she was sitting next to Trump in the first-class section of a plane – they were total strangers – when he lifted the armrest, grabbed her breasts, and tried to get under her skirt. She says, “He was like an octopus, his hands were everywhere.” She says “it was an assault,” and she fled to the back of the plane.
Rachel Crooks says she was a receptionist in Trump Tower when Trump suddenly took it upon himself to kiss her on the mouth. She was repulsed, but felt powerless. She told her boyfriend about it, and he now says, “I think that what was more upsetting than him kissing her was that she felt like she couldn’t do anything to him because of his position. She was 22. She was a secretary. It was her first job out of college. I remember her saying, ‘ can’t do anything to this guy, because he’s Donald Trump.'”
Mindy McGillivray says she was groped by Trump at Mar-a-Lago; a photographer says that McGillivray told him at the time: “Donald just grabbed my ass!”
Bestselling author Natasha Stoynoff says she was interviewing Donald and Melania when Donald insisted on giving her a tour of Mar-a-Lago. He steered her into a room. She recalls, “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. Now, I’m a tall, strapping girl who grew up wrestling two giant brothers. I even once sparred with Mike Tyson. It takes a lot to push me. But Trump is much bigger – a looming figure – and he was fast, taking me by surprise and throwing me off balance.”
The newbies were preceded by Cassandra Searles, a former beauty contest winner, who wrote this summer on Facebook: “He probably doesn’t want me telling the story about that time he continually grabbed my ass and invited me to his hotel room.” And there’s Jill Harth, a businesswoman, who said earlier this year that Trump harassed her to the point of “attempted rape.” She said this summer, “He pushed me up against the wall, and had his hands all over me and tried to get up my dress again….How could he be doing this when I’m there for business?” And there’s Temple Taggart, a former Miss Utah, who said earlier this year: “He kissed me directly on the lips. I thought, ‘Oh my God, 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.'”
Trump, just for the record, is denying that any of this ever happened – when a New York Times reporter asked him for comment, he called her “a disgusting human being” – but I’ll simply quote his former ghostwriter, Tony Schwartz: “Lying is second nature to him. More than anyone else I have ever met, Trump has the ability to convince himself that whatever he is saying at any given moment is true, or sort of true, or at least ought to be true.”
Politically, the lying is a big problem. Even the most spineless Republicans – the ones who have smashed their moral compasses – surely realize after last night that his Sunday denial won’t hold up. Do they truly want to wear the tattered Trump armband for the next 26 days, living in fear that more women will come forward, never knowing when the next shoe will drop?
They’re already hemorrhaging support among women (who typicallycomprise 53 percent of the presidential electorate), as evidenced by the latest poll that shows Trump losing in crucial Pennsylvania by nine points, thanks to the Philadelphia suburbs. Trumpkin Republicans have perhaps convinced themselves that Trump’s desperate parading of Bill Clinton’s accusers will somehow turn the tide, but there’s no evidence that swing voters give a hoot. If only because – breaking news! – Bill Clinton is not on the ballot.
Speaking of desperation, Trump is now threatening to sue The New York Times for its story about Jessica Leeds and Rachel Crooks. In all likelihood, that’s just empty bluster from a cornered animal, but I dearly do hope he sues. Because he’d be questioned under oath about those women, in a deposition that might well prove embarrassing. It would also require a major expenditure of time, but very soon – though not soon enough – his calendar will be open.
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