During her interview with Anderson Cooper this weekend Melania Trump claimed the following about the story about Donald Trump forcibly kissing one of their reporters Natasha Stoynoff at Mar-A-Lago:
Melanie Trump: The story that came out in People magazine, the writer she said my husband took her to the room and started kissing her, she wrote in the same story about me that she saw me on 5th Avenue, and I said to her ‘Natasha, how come we don’t see you anymore?’ I was never friends with her, I would not recognize her.
Well as it turns out People has a new report today that includes 5 different witnesses to Miss Stoynaff’s report of being assaulted by Donald Trump in 2005, and another who was there when Melania greeted her on 5th Avenue.
Oops.
Melania was indeed very convincing and compelling as she argued the Donald is completely innocent, that he was just doing “Boy’s Talk” after he was “Egg On” by Billy Bush and that everything that’s come out about his private behavior with women has been entirely the construction of the “Media Clintons”. It’s all Lies designed to stop Donald’s campaign.
Yeah, uh no.
People magazine revealed 6 witnesses who confirm Stoynoff’s account of what happened during her 2005 interview with Trump. Witnesses included colleagues and close friends of Stoynoff, including her friend Liza Herz, who was with Stoynoff the day she ran into Melania Trump on 5th Avenue.
However, Herz remembered the two running into each other, noting “They chatted in a friendly way. And what struck me most was that Melania was carrying a child and wearing heels.”
Herz is not the only witness to come forward. The five other witnesses include Marina Grasic, who told People that Stoynoff called her the day after the assault and detailed what happened to her.
Her former journalism professor Paul McLaughlin also spoke with People about Stoynoff’s story and said that she called him that same night seeking advice.
The other witnesses include People’s East Coast Editor Liz McNeil, their Deputy East Coast News Editor Mary Green, and a coworker named Liza Hamm. Each witness spoke to Stoynoff’s character — both personal and professional and detailed how the reporter shared her story.
McNeil told People, “She was very upset and told me how he shoved her against a wall.” She continued, “The thing I remember most was how scared she was. I felt I had to protect her.”
Hamm, a coworker and friend shared, “Natasha has always been a vivacious person who wants to believe in the best of people, and this experience definitely messed with that outlook. But she is also a consummate professional. She told me that she asked to be taken off the Trump beat, but she tried her best to move past the experience and continue to do her job well.”
“They’re Liars.” What was that whole thing about Hillary Clinton “attacking women” who had accused her husband of having mistresses and sexual assault? She criticized them? She “demeaned” them?
This is a point that even one of the other accusers has made.
Leeds, who claims Trump groped her 35 years ago while on a plane, told TMZ that Melania’s defense of her husband is akin to Hillary Clinton’s defense of Bill in the 90s.
She said, “The wives are in a difficult position if they want to save their marriage. They’ll make compromises and accept the good with the bad.”
She added, “I feel it’s terrible Melania is being viewed as sympathetic when Donald is beating up on Hillary for doing the same with Bill.”
Ok, fine, she did criticize those she thought were unfairly attacking her husband and at the time she was viewed sympathetically just as Melania is now, but Clinton never herself lied and claimed an event that did happen didn’t in order to cover up for her husband, now did she?
When Clinton talked about a “vast right-wing conspiracy” she wasn’t entirely wrong. David Brock had been a reporter for the American Spectator funded by Richard Melon Scaif at the time which had an “Arkansas Project” that even before he announced his run for President had been focused on knee-capping Bill Clinton with scandals. Brock wrote the original Trooper-Gate story that revealed Paula Jones. He had previously coined the phrase “A Little Bit Nutty, A Little Bit Slutty” in order to discredit the sexual harassment allegations of Anita Hill against Justice Clarence Thomas. He was a rising superstar in Right-wing world and was close friends with people like Dinesh D’Souza, Laura Ingraham and Ann Coulter who aided the Paula Jones attorneys behind the scenes. Eventually Brock had a change of heart and revealed this to people linked to Hillary as he was writing a book about her, then documented all of his in his another book “Blinded by the Right.” and now runs Media Matters which is dedicated to highlight right-wing media bias. In his book he outlined how a network of media outlets from Scaif’s American Spectator to Bill Kristol’s Weekly Standard, Drudge. Fox News. Newsmax. Breibart make it quite obvious that they are ideologically bent. Clinton was only wrong in saying it was a “conspiracy”, because it’s quite out in the open. That isn’t exactly as true with Newsweek, People, The Washington Post or New York Times who’ve all done plenty of stories criticizing Bill back then and Hillary now.
The Trump’s have been making the argument that all of the nine women who’ve come forward in the week and a half since #PussyGate have been lying all this time. But the problem is that many, although not all of them, had previously told other people about what had happened between t them and Donald and everything they said then matches up exactly with what Donald was bragging about to Billy Bush.
No, most of them don’t have visual witnesses to the assault at the time — or else they would have taken Trump to court the way that Jill Harth and Katie Johnson have — a couple have contrary witnesses including Stoynoff, but the issue is this.
How did they know 30 and 15 and 10 years ago exactly what Donald Trump was going to say to Access Hollywood?
There’s only one explanation: They knew because it had happened to them first hand.
Wednesday, Oct 19, 2016 · 3:32:49 AM +00:00
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Frank Vyan Walton
On the issue of whether these are “Witnesses” or not, my initial impression was that they wouldn’t be able to testify, except for the woman who was their the Ms. Stoynaff on 5th Avenue, due to the Hearsay Rule but as has been pointed out in the comments there is an exception to that rule as Outcry Witnesses.
Outcry witness typically refers to an adult who hears a child's outcry regarding the child's abuse. The outcry witness is obligated to report the abuse to the proper authorities. In a trial, discovery may include preparation of a videotaped statement by the alleged victim, and examination of any written statements by the alleged victim, the outcry witness, and any other alleged witnesses. The outcry witness is the person who first hears an allegation of abuse by the child or other victim of abuse or sexual crime.
So yes, what these five people have now said could be admissible in court as witnesses depending on the rulings of the presiding judge.