After Weinstein fell, Trump accusers wonder why not him?
Almost a year after New Yorker Jessica Leeds and other women stepped forward with harrowing accounts of being sexually assaulted by a powerful man, another scandal with similar elements exploded.
Only this time, the punishment was swift and devastating.
“It is hard to reconcile that Harvey Weinstein could be brought down with this, and (President Donald) Trump just continues to be the Teflon Don,” said Leeds, who claims she was groped 30 years ago on a plane by the man whose presence she cannot escape now that he sits in the Oval Office.
In Florida, Melinda McGillivray, was having much the same reaction.
“What pisses me off is that the guy is president,” McGillivray, who a year ago went public with allegations that Trump grabbed her at Mar-a-Lago in 2003 when she was 23. “It’s that simple.”
Leeds and McGillivray were among the 11 women who came forward in the 2016 campaign to accuse the then-Republican presidential candidate of unwanted touching or kissing. Trump called the charges “pure fiction” and referred to the women as “horrible, horrible liars.”
Since then, numerous men in high places have been felled by charges of sexual misconduct. Most notable among them were Bill O’Reilly, the star Fox News anchor ousted less than a year after Roger Ailes, the network’s cofounder; and Weinstein, once regarded as one of the most influential figures in the entertainment business.
But for Trump’s accusers, the renewed debate offers a reminder that their allegations did not have the same effect.
Trump, unlike Weinstein, was able to deflect their claims — despite the disclosure of a video in which he was heard bragging about the kind of behavior some of the women had alleged. Trump has never followed through with his vow to sue his accusers or produce the “substantial evidence” he said would refute their claims.
So far, the allegations against the president have led to a single new lawsuit filed by a Trump accuser who argues that the president defamed her when he denied her allegations — a case that Trump’s lawyer Marc Kasowitz called a “completely contrived, totally meritless lawsuit, which we expect to be summarily dismissed.”
Kasowitz did not respond to questions about the other women’s claims.
The frustrations of some Trump accusers surfaced publicly in the days after the New York Times revealed the allegations against Weinstein.
“My pain is everyday with b-----d Trump as President,” tweeted Jill Harth, who once worked with Trump on organizing beauty pageants and sued him in 1997, claiming he had repeatedly groped her breasts, tried to touch her genitals and kissed her against her will. “No one gets it unless it happens to them. NO one!”
Harth, who is now a makeup artist in New York and declined to be interviewed, also accused Trump of getting into bed, uninvited, with one of the 22-year-old contestants in the early 1990s, according to allegations detailed in the Boston Globe.
Cathy Heller, who last year told the Guardian that Trump forcibly kissed the side of her mouth during a brunch at Mar-a-Lago in 1997, expressed dismay that “nothing stuck” against him.
Heller said she wondered whether the fame of Weinstein’s accusers — who include Oscar winners such as Gwyneth Paltrow — played a role in how their claims were received.
Heller said Weinstein’s removal from his production company made her glad that “finally something was really done and a guy finally got his dues, his just deserts,” she said. “We’ll see about Trump. It’s never too late.”
McGillivray, now 37, said she was initially afraid to speak out, calling it “petrifying.” But she said she felt driven by a patriotic duty — as well as a desire to do right by her teenage daughter.
After the allegations against Weinstein were made public, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel argued on CNN that Trump’s alleged offenses were “not even comparable” to Weinstein’s, adding that “to even make that comparison is disrespectful to the president.”