“I immediately felt violated” – Former campaign staffer alleges in lawsuit that Trump kissed her without her consent
An Alabama woman who worked on Donald Trump’s presidential campaign claimed in a Monday lawsuit that Trump kissed her “without her consent” in front of multiple people during a political event in Florida in 2016 – an accusation the White House is denying.
The woman, Alva Johnson, filed suit Monday against Trump and his presidential campaign in federal court in Tampa.
The lawsuit said Johnson served as the campaign’s director of outreach
and coalitions for the state of Alabama, before working to help Trump in
Florida during the general election.
“To Defendant Trump, however, Ms. Johnson was nothing more than a sexual
object he felt entitled to dominate and humiliate,” the lawsuit states.
“Like he has done with so many other women, Defendant Trump violated
norms of decency and privacy by kissing Ms. Johnson on the lips without
her consent in the middle of a Florida work event and in front of
numerous other Campaign officials.”
Almost three years later, a woman who worked on the Trump campaign is
now suing Trump for allegedly forcibly kissing her during a campaign
rally.
Here’s the lowdown..
NY POST – A former Trump campaign staffer claims in a new lawsuit that the then-presidential candidate forcibly kissed her in 2016.
Alva Johnson says the Republican candidate grabbed her hand and tried to kiss her on the lips during a rally in Tampa, Fla., on Aug. 24, 2016, according to the suit, which was filed Monday and first reported by the Washington Post.
But Johnson turned her head and Trump wound up kissing the side of her mouth, she said.
She called the encounter, which happened as Trump was exiting an RV outside the rally, “super-creepy and inappropriate.”
“I immediately felt violated because I wasn’t expecting it or wanting it,” she told the Washington Post. “I can still see his lips coming straight for my face.”
She sure makes it sound “super-creepy”.
More on that later.
Johnson voted for Obama in 2008, 2012…but thought Trump could help black communities:
Johnson, a 43-year-old mom of four who lives in Madison County, Ala., said she first met Trump at a Birmingham rally in November 2015.
“Oh, beautiful, beautiful, fantastic,” he said while looking her up and down, the suit claims.
The event planner didn’t have a background in politics and voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012.
But she believed Trump’s business acumen might help black communities.
Trump grabbed her by the……hand…and then went for the lips:
It was inside one of those RVs where Trump allegedly planted a kiss on Johnson. She had brought volunteers inside to snap photos with Trump but noticed the married father of five was trying to make eye contact with her, she said in the interview and lawsuit.
As Trump was leaving the RV to attend the rally, Johnson told him, “I’ve been on the road for you since March, away from my family. You’re doing an awesome job. Go in there and kick ass.”
That’s when she claims Trump grabbed her hand, thanked her and leaned forward.
“Oh, my God, I think he’s going to kiss me,” she recalled in the interview. “He’s coming straight for my lips. So I turn my head, and he kisses me right on corner of my mouth, still holding my hand the entire time. Then he walks on out.”
Johnson says there were two witnesses, but both of them, including Pam Bondi, deny anything happened:
Johnson claims two Trump supporters saw the encounter — Karen Giorno, the head of the Florida campaign, and then-Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. Both denied seeing the alleged kiss.
“Do I recall seeing anything inappropriate? One hundred percent no,” Bondi said in an interview. “I’m a prosecutor, and if I saw something inappropriate, I would have said something.”
Giorno said Johnson’s allegations were “ridiculous” and “that absolutely did not happen.”
But family members and her boyfriend said Johnson told them about the alleged kiss. She continued working for the Trump campaign — even after an offer to work at the New York headquarters was made, then yanked in mid-September, she and campaign officials said.
Johnson is suing Trump and his campaign for emotional pain and suffering and seeking unspecified damages.
Whether you want to believe her story or you don’t, the fact that she has two witnesses who say it never happened won’t do her lawsuit any good.
To me, the fact that she claims two witnesses that repudiate her
account, makes this story kinda smell like what happened to Kavanaugh
last year during his confirmation process.
I’m not proclaiming Trump’s innocence by any stretch. But her story just seems like a stretch to me.
She says it was ‘forced’ kissing. Why would Trump try and forcibly
kiss someone in front of two witnesses? What she’s describing, if
anything, sounds like an intended peck on the lips. But she
characterizes it in the worst way possible, to make you picture a big
wet Harvey-Weinstein style forced kiss or something.
And she’s waited all this time over this? Did someone recruit her? Or did she just decide to do this on her own?
Again, I don’t know if Trump tried to kiss her or not. Just pointing out how the story smells like a hit, even if its not.
Alva Johnson speaks out in tearful interview about her claim Trump 'forcibly kissed' her
ReplyDeleteFormer Trump campaign staffer Alva Johnson broke down in tears Tuesday night while explaining her accusations that President Trump “forcibly kissed” her during the 2016 election.
Johnson, who has filed a lawsuit against the president, told MSNBC she'd joined the Trump campaign because she believed the White House needed a “businessman” despite thinking he “didn’t have a chance of winning.” She described her role as an “outreach” director in Alabama, where she organized “one of the largest rallies” at the time with then-Sen. Jeff Sessions in attendance.
Johnson said in August 2016, she briefly interacted with then-candidate Trump on an RV during a campaign stop in Florida. Before he stepped off the bus to speak with campaign interns, she told him to “go kick ass” and said she hadn’t seen her family in a very long time. And, after he told her he wouldn’t “let you down,” Johnson said Trump held her hand and began getting closer.
“I just had a lot of internal dialogue. I’m like, ‘okay, is he gonna hug me?’ And then he keeps coming closer. And I’m like, ‘is he gonna hug me?’ I’m like, ‘oh my God, I think he’s going to kiss me’ because he was coming directly towards my face,’” Johnson told MSNBC host Chris Hayes.
The former campaign staffer then said once she realized Trump was going to kiss her, she turned her head, which left his lips touching the corner of her mouth.
“I was just kinda frozen. I didn’t know how to process it. I knew it was inappropriate because I worked in human resources. So I knew that it was completely inappropriate,” Johnson continued. “It was gross and creepy. Like I could sometimes still see those lips.”
“This accusation is absurd on its face. This never happened and is directly contradicted by multiple highly credible eye witness accounts,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said Monday.
Johnson rejected Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi’s denial that she witnessed the alleged interaction after naming her as one of two witnesses, insisting Bondi’s statement was “not true.”
Following the alleged interaction, Johnson said she “pushed it” in the back of her mind and continued doing her job, but it wasn’t until the October 2016 release of the “Access Hollywood” tape that prompted her to leave the campaign. “When I heard the audio, I was, like, screaming in my car. I’m like, ‘oh my God, that’s exactly what he did to me.’ Like, he literally described exactly what he did to me, minus the grab the ‘P,’” Johnson said.
She told Hayes she was “afraid” to tell the campaign why she was leaving and that she sought a lawyer as other women came forward with allegations against Trump, but “for business reasons” didn’t carry on with her case.
When asked why she waited so long to bring the lawsuit and for offering praise for the president in 2017 as well as applying for a position at the White House, Johnson pointed to a nondisclosure agreement she signed, which she claimed made it feel like her “vocal cords had been clipped for years.”
Johnson started getting tearful while describing the “guilt” she felt after the 2017 protest violence in Charlottesville, Va., and the separations of migrant families last year.
“Then you have him mocking women with the #MeToo movement, making fun of them and for me, I’m sitting there and I’m like, this is exactly what you did to me, and I don’t want to keep my mouth shut,” an emotional Johnson told Hayes.