Toronto journalism professor backs Trump accuser

A Toronto-based professor and writer is backing former Toronto Star journalist Natasha Stoynoff, who has accused Donald Trump of sexually assaulting her in 2005 while she was on assignment for People magazine.

Paul McLaughlin says Stoynoff is telling the truth, and her story hasn’t changed since she first told him about it shortly after the alleged attack. “The reason I’m speaking about this — and it is with her blessing, by the way — is that she is being accused by a man running for the presidency of the United States of being a complete liar, of fabricating a story about something that for her was quite horrible,” he said.

Stoynoff did not respond to the Star’s requests for comment.

“Now (Trump’s) got to say that I’m a liar, too, and I’m not. I’m telling the truth,” said McLaughlin, who recalled Stoynoff being deeply disturbed by the encounter with Trump.

“It really shook her and she didn’t know what to do, and among the people that she would turn to, I was one that she would call and ask for advice, and that’s what she did,” said McLaughlin, a former Ryerson journalism professor who now teaches at the University of Toronto.

McLaughlin said he told her not to go public with her accusation at the time, in order to protect her career.

“Here he is with his very pregnant wife in an adjacent room; he is not the type of person who is going to admit what he did. And I thought that because there was no evidence other than her word versus his word that he could easily turn around and accuse her of hitting on him and he could destroy her career,” he recalled.

On Wednesday, Stoynoff published her story online in People.

Trump has denied the allegations and said the story was made up.