US presidential nominee Donald Trump has used the third and final presidential debate to deny the many sexual harassment and assault allegations currently being made against him.
Addressing the claims on Wednesday evening, the 69-year-old claimed that “those stories have been largely debunked.”
The republican then continued, “Those people, I don’t know those people. I believe it was her party that did it,” he said referring to democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
“Those stories are all totally false, I have to say that,” the reality star continued, adding, “I didn’t even apologise to my wife…because I didn’t do anything. I didn’t know any of these women, I didn’t see these women… I think they want either fame or her campaign did it,” he said pointing at Clinton once more.
“It was all lies, it was fiction,” he said finally.
On October 7, a flood gate opened when a 2005 video tape of Donald Trump bragging about sexually assaulting women emerged. Since the world heard the United States presidential candidate say being famous meant he could do whatever he wanted to women including “grab them by the pussy” several women have come forward accusing of sexual assault and harassment.
These allegations are only a drop in the bucket of Donald Trump’s alleged history of sexual misconduct.
Here is a timeline of all the sexual assault, sexual harassment, and rape allegations against Donald Trump.
1970s – Alleged Sexual Assault
On October 12 the New York Times published a report in which two women accused Trump of sexual assault. One of those women is Jessica Leeds, 74. More than 30 years ago a then 38-year-old Leeds sat beside Trump in the first-class cabin of a fight to New York. Leeds claims that about 45 minutes after takeoff, Trump lifted the armrest between them grabbed her breasts and tried to put his hand up her skirt.
“He was like an octopus,” she said. “His hands were everywhere.”
In a speech today, Trump called Leeds allegations “another ridiculous tale, no witnesses, no nothing.”
1989 – Alleged Rape
In 1993, Harry Hurt III published a book called Lost Tycoon: The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump which revealed that in a deposition during their very contentious 1990 divorce, Ivana Trump accused Donald Trump of rape.
Last year, The Daily Beast brought the book and its allegations back to the media’s attention by reporting that in the book Hurt writes that in 1989 Trump confronted Ivana after a painful scalp surgery to reduce his bald spot. Allegedly, he yelled at her because it was her plastic surgeon that performed the procedure and then held back her arms and pulled hair from her head before ripping her clothes off and raping her. He allegedly yelled that her “fucking doctor” ruined him, and then held back her arms and pulled out fistfuls of hair from Ivana’s scalp, before ripping off her clothes and forcing himself inside her.
Before the Hurt's book was released, Donald Trump and his lawyers provided the following statement from Ivana:
"During a deposition given by me in connection with my matrimonial case, I stated that my husband had raped me. [O]n one occasion during 1989, Mr. Trump and I had marital relations in which he behaved very differently toward me than he had during our marriage. As a woman, I felt violated, as the love and tenderness, which he normally exhibited towards me, was absent. I referred to this as a ‘rape,’ but I do not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.”
The statement was printed on the first page of the book.
In response to The Daily Beast bringing the 1993 book back into the news, Trump's attorney Michael Cohen denied the scalp surgery and the rape, claiming incorrectly that a man can't rape his own wife.
1992, 1993 - Alleged Sexual Assault
In late 1992, early 1993, Jill Harth and her then-fiance were in talks with Trump about a proposed partnership for their beauty pageant business. According to the New York Times in 1997, Harth and her partner filed a lawsuit against Trump for breach of contract. In addition to that suit Harth also filed a sexual harassment suit accusing Trump of cornering and groping her in his daughters bedroom in 1993. According to the Times, Harth says that that event was only one of a string of assaults, “Harth says that she worried about being raped by a man who weighed twice as much as she did, and at one point she vomited as a defense mechanism. But she says that he was never violent and genuinely seemed to assume sexual interest on her part; often he was playful as she was frightened: 'His mind was in a totally different place than mine,' Harth recalls. 'He thinks he’s God’s gift to women.'"
Harth says she withdrew her suit as a condition for settling the breach of contract suit.
Earlier this year, Trump told the Boston Globe that Harth only claimed sexual assault because the business suit wasn't going in her favour.
1993 - Alleged Sexual Harassment
In an editorial for Vanity Fair, editor Graydon Carter recalled what happened with he invited Donald Trump to the 1993 White House Correspondents' Dinner as a “novelty guest”. Carter claims that 45 minutes after Trump sat down next to Swedish model Vendela Kirsebom, she came over to Carter almost in tears begging him to move her to a different seat.
“It seems that Trump had spent his entire time with her assaying the ‘tits’ and legs of the other female guests and asking how they measured up to those of other women, including his wife,” Carter explains. ‘“He is,’ she told me, in words that seemed familiar, ‘the most vulgar man I have ever met.’”
1994, 1995 - Alleged Rape
A woman has filed a lawsuit against Trump accusing him of raping her in 1994 and 1995 when she was just 13-years-old.
According to the suit, Trump allegedly forcibily had sex with the plantiff during a party at the New York City apartment of billionaire and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein
According to BuzzFeed, Trump has “vehemently denied the rape claims, which are being filed in a New York civil court for the third time".
The trial begins December 16th and according to Buzzfeed, Trump himself will have to speak in court during the trial.
1997 - Alleged Sexual Assault
In 1997, a then 21-year-old Temple Taggart McDowell was representing Utah in the Miss USA beauty pageant. According to the Daily Beast, McDowell claims that Trump kissed her on the lips multiple times without her consent.
She says that she was “shocked” by the fact that he felt entitled to kiss her on the lips and claims that after one of the kisses a woman from the pageant warned her not to go into a room with alone with Trump.
Trump has called the accusation “ridiculous.”
2005 - Alleged Sexual Assault
The other woman who accuses Trump of assault in the recent New York Times piece is Rachel Crooks.
Crooks alleges that in 2005 while she was working as the receptionist for a real-estate firm in Trump Tower, she ran into Trump in the elevator. She claims that after they shook hands he refused to let her go, kissed her on the cheeks and then directly on the mouth. “It was so inappropriate,” Crooks told the Times. “I was so upset that he thought I was so insignificant that he could do that.”
Trump has called the story a "fabrication".
2005 - Sexual Assault
In a recent essay for People magazine, staff writer Natasha Stoynoff, claims that Trump assaulted her and forcibly kissed her in 2005 while she was interviewing Trump and his wife Melania in Florida on their one year anniversary.
Stoynoff claims that Trump was giving her a tour when he shut the door and pushed her against a wall and kissed her.
Now, I’m a tall, strapping girl who grew up wrestling two giant brothers. I even once sparred with Mike Tyson. It takes a lot to push me. But Trump is much bigger — a looming figure — and he was fast, taking me by surprise, and throwing me off balance. I was stunned. And I was grateful when Trump’s longtime butler burst into the room a minute later, as I tried to unpin myself.”
Stoynoff says Trump then informed her that they were going to have an affair. She says she didn't report the assault at the time because she blamed herself and was worried about what reporting it would do to her job.
2013 - Alleged Sexual Assault
According to Rolling Stone, in a Facebook post earlier this year, Miss Washington USA 2013 Cassandra Searles claimed Trump grabbed her ass and invited her back to his hotel room. Searles called called Trump a “misogynist”, and claimed that he treated her and the other contestants like "cattle" he could line up " so he could get a closer look at his property.”
All of these are allegations only. But they are mounting.
Watch this space for more updates to the sexual-related accusations that may come to light in the coming days and weeks.