Donald
Trump groped me in what felt like a ‘twisted game’ with Jeffrey Epstein, former
model alleges
Stacey
Williams says the ex-president, whose spokesperson denied the allegations,
touched her in an unwanted sexual way in 1993, after Epstein introduced them
Stephanie
Kirchgaessner and Lucy Osborne
Wed 23 Oct
2024 18.53 EDT
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/23/donald-trump-accuser-stacey-williams-jeffrey-epstein
A former
model who says she met Donald Trump through the late sexual abuser Jeffrey
Epstein has accused the former president of groping and sexually touching her
in an incident in Trump Tower in 1993, in what she believed was a “twisted
game” between the two men.
Stacey
Williams, who worked as a professional model in the 1990s, said she first met
Trump in 1992 at a Christmas party after being introduced to him by Epstein,
who she believed was a good friend of the then New York real estate developer.
Williams said Epstein was interested in her and the two casually dated for a
period of a few months.
“It became
very clear then that he and Donald were really, really good friends and spent a
lot of time together,” Williams said.
The alleged
groping occurred some months later, in the late winter or early spring of 1993,
when Epstein suggested during a walk they were on that he and Williams stop by
to visit Trump at Trump Tower. Epstein was later convicted on sex offenses and
killed himself in prison in 2019.
Moments
after they arrived, she alleges, Trump greeted Williams, pulled her toward him
and started groping her. She said he put his hands “all over my breasts” as
well as her waist and her buttocks. She said she froze because she was “deeply
confused” about what was happening. At the same time, she said she believed she
saw the two men smiling at each other.
Karoline
Leavitt, the press secretary for Donald Trump’s campaign, provided a statement
denying the allegations, which said in part: “These accusations, made by a
former activist for Barack Obama and announced on a Harris campaign call two
weeks before the election, are unequivocally false. It’s obvious this fake
story was contrived by the Harris campaign.”
Williams
says that Trump sent her agent a postcard via courier later in 1993, an aerial
view of Mar-a-Lago, his Palm Beach residence and resort. She shared it with the
Guardian. In his handwriting – using what appears to be his usual black Sharpie
– he wrote: “Stacey – Your home away from home. Love Donald”.
Williams,
who is 56 and a native of Pennsylvania, has shared parts of her allegation on
social media posts in the past, but revealed details about the alleged
encounter on a call on Monday organized by a group called Survivors for Kamala,
which supports Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris. The Zoom call
featured actor Ashley Judd and law professor and academic Anita Hill, among
others. Survivors for Kamala also took out an ad in the New York Times this
week, signed by 200 survivors of sexual and gender violence, which was meant to
serve as a reminder that Trump has been found liable for sexual abuse in a
court.
After the
alleged incident, Williams said that she and Epstein left Trump Tower, and that
she began to feel Epstein growing angry at her.
“Jeffrey and
I left and he didn’t look at me or speak to me and I felt this seething rage
around me, and when we got down to the sidewalk, he looked at me and just
berated me, and said: ‘Why did you let him do that?’” she said on the Zoom
call.
“He made me
feel so disgusting and I remember being so utterly confused,” she said.
She
described how the alleged incident seemed to her to be part of a “twisted
game”.
“I felt
shame and disgust and as we went our separate ways, I felt this sensation of
revisiting it, while the hands were all over me. And I had this horrible pit in
my stomach that it was somehow orchestrated. I felt like a piece of meat,” she
said in an interview with the Guardian.
She and
Epstein parted ways soon after. Williams said she never had any knowledge of
his pattern of sexual abuse, which would later become known. Epstein is now
considered one of the worst and most prolific pedophiles in modern history.
The
allegation of groping and unwanted sexual touching follows a well-documented
pattern of behavior by Trump.
About two
dozen women have accused the former president, who has been convicted of
multiple felonies, of sexual misconduct dating back decades. The allegations
have included claims of Trump kissing them without their consent, reaching
under their skirts, and, in the case of some beauty pageant contestants,
walking in on them in the changing room.
A former
model named Amy Dorris shared allegations about Trump similar to what Williams
described in an interview with the Guardian in 2020. Trump denied ever having
harassed, abused or behaved improperly toward Dorris.
Last year, a
jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing the columnist E Jean Carroll in
1996 and awarded her $5m in a judgment.
Williams’
allegations raise new questions about Trump’s relationship with Epstein.
No evidence
has surfaced that Trump was aware of or involved in Epstein’s misconduct.
But Trump
and Epstein knew each other for decades and were photographed at the same
social events in the 1990s and early 2000s, years before Epstein pleaded guilty
in Florida in 2008 to state charges of soliciting and procuring a minor for
prostitution.
“I’ve known
Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy,” Trump told New York magazine in 2002. “He’s a
lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as
I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”
After
Epstein was arrested on sex-trafficking charges in 2019, Trump told journalists
in the Oval Office that he “knew him, like everybody in Palm Beach knew him”
but that he had a “falling out” with Epstein in the early 2000s.
“I haven’t
spoken to him in 15 years,” Trump said. “I was not a fan of his, that I can
tell you.”
Asked
whether she had considered coming forward in the past, as other women were
making allegations against Trump, Williams said she was a person who wanted to
avoid negative attention or risk the backlash many other survivors have faced.
“I left the
business,” she said. “I disappeared on purpose because I love being anonymous
and I love my life of being a private citizen. Then I watched what has happened
to women who come out and it is so horrifying and abusive. The thought of doing
that, especially as a mother with a child in my house, was just not possible,”
she told the Guardian.
“I just
chose in my own way – comments on social media to contradict people who said he
didn’t do anything,” she said.
Like other
survivors, she said, she has processed what happened to her and became more
confident about facing an angry backlash, she said.
Williams
spoke about the allegations to at least two friends who spoke to the Guardian.
One friend, who asked not to be named, said Williams told her about the alleged
incident in 2005 or 2006 during a conversation in which Williams mentioned
knowing Epstein, and how he had introduced her to Trump. The friend
specifically remembers Williams telling her that she had been groped by Trump.
Epstein was not a household name at the time, but the friend would later recall
the anecdote when the Epstein scandal erupted.
“What I
recall is that it was groping … what we would call feeling someone up,” the
friend said.
Ally
Gutwillinger, another longtime friend, said Williams told her about the alleged
incident in 2015. Gutwillinger remembers the timing because Trump had announced
that he was running for president.
“I went to
her house sometime in that week and I saw a postcard of Mar-a-Lago and I said:
‘What’s this?’ and she said ‘Turn it over,’” Gutwillinger said. “She said
something like: ‘He’s vile, he groped me in Trump Tower.’”
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