Former model accuses Trump of sexual assault in 1997
WASHINGTON: A former model has claimed that she was sexually assaulted more than two decades ago by Donald Trump, who was a real estate magnate at the time, in his VIP box at the US Open tennis tournament in New York.
“He just shoved his tongue down my throat and I was pushing him off,” Amy Dorris told The Guardian in an exclusive interview, recalling in detail the whole incident that she said took place in 1997.
Trump was 51 at the time and was married to his second wife Marla Maples, while Dorris, who later acted in the TV series Law & Order, was 24.
The US president’s lawyers denied the incident took place at all and raised several questions about her account, the British newspaper said.
There would have been witnesses at such a public place as the US Open, they have argued and questioned why she, who was there with her then boyfriend, continued to visit and meet Trump after the alleged incident and even sat with him at the memorial service for fashion designer Gianni Versace.
Dorris did not report the incident, which took place on September 5, 1997, to law enforcement, but she told a friend and her mother about it. She also spoke about it to other people and a therapist in the intervening years. The Guardian said it has corroborated her account with people she had confided in at the time.
The former model, who is a mother of twin daughters and lives in Florida, has said that she did consider speaking out about the assault in 2016, when Trump was the Republican candidate for president.
But she changed her mind because she feared she might end up harming her family.
“Now I feel like my girls are about to turn 13 years old and I want them to know that you don’t let anybody do anything to you that you don’t want,” she has said. “And I’d rather be a role model. I want them to see that I didn’t stay quiet, that I stood up to somebody who did something that was unacceptable.”
Dorris joins a long list of women who have accused Trump over the years of forcing himself on them, groping or sexually assaulting them.
While Trump and his lawyers have strenuously dismissed those allegations, he has bragged about assaulting women and forcing himself on them, as he did on the infamous Access Hollywood tapes that nearly ended his campaign in October 2016.
E Jean Carroll, a columnist who has alleged that Trump raped her at a Manhattan department store decades ago, filed a defamation suit against the US president in 2019 for accusing her of “totally lying” while rejecting her claims. Trump denied her account in an interview with The Hill, saying she “wasn’t his type,” prompting Carroll to file a suit. Carroll’s attorneys have sought Trump’s
DNA sample.
He is being defended by justice department lawyers in what is being seen as an unusual move, starting early this month.
“The allegations are totally false,” Jenna Ellis, legal adviser to the Trump campaign, said about Dorris’ claim. “We will consider every legal means available to hold The Guardian accountable for its malicious publication of this unsubstantiated story. This is just another pathetic attempt to attack President Trump right before the election.”