New sexual assault allegations surface against Trump

PanARMENIAN.Net - Several women levied allegations of sexual assault against Donald Trump on Wednesday, October 12 in a series of interviews, adding to the already damaging revelations about the Republican presidential nominee's aggressive sexual comments about women, the Associated Press reports.

Trump's campaign dismissed the allegations as having no merit or veracity, and it attacked one of the media outlets that published the women's accounts as acting on a vendetta. In a letter from his attorneys, Trump demanded The New York Times retract what it called a "libelous article" and apologize.

"For The New York Times to launch a completely false, coordinated character assassination against Mr. Trump on a topic like this is dangerous," Jason Miller, Trump's campaign spokesman, said in a separate statement. "To reach back decades in an attempt to smear Mr. Trump trivializes sexual assault, and it sets a new low for where the media is willing to go in its efforts to determine this election."

A story published in The Times said Jessica Leeds, 74, of New York, told the newspaper she encountered Trump on an airline flight three decades ago. Leeds said Trump grabbed her breasts and tried to put his hand up her skirt. "He was like an octopus," she told the newspaper. "His hands were everywhere."

Hillary Clinton's communication's director, Jennifer Palmieri, said in a statement the latest run of allegations "sadly fits everything we know about the way Donald Trump has treated women."

The interviews come just days after the publication of a recording from 2005, on which Trump made a series of vulgar and sexually predatory comments about women. While waiting to make a cameo appearance on a soap opera, he bragged to then-"Access Hollywood" host Billy Bush that his fame allowed him to force himself on women.