By Jennifer Peltz | Associated Press
NEW YORK — As Donald Trump ran for and served as president, over a dozen women publicly accused him of sexual assault and harassment. Most of those claims — all denied by Trump — were never taken to court. None has gone to trial. But that is about to change.
Jury selection starts Tuesday in E. Jean Carroll’s rape lawsuit in a New York federal court. The former Elle magazine advice columnist alleges that Trump raped her in a luxury department store dressing room in the mid-1990s.
Carroll’s civil case has taken a winding road to trial. It now comes as Trump is seeking to return to the White House and battling a roster of legal problems, including his recent indictment on charges of doctoring his business’ records to conceal hush-money payments to a porn star.
Here’s a look at the case and some key questions:
WHAT’S THE CASE ABOUT?
Carroll says a chance meeting with Trump at Bergdorf Goodman suddenly turned into sexual violence in 1995 or 1996. According to her court complaint, Trump ushered her to a fitting room after they joked about trying on a bodysuit, and then he pinned her against the wall and forced himself on her as she tried to break free.
She said she ultimately kneed him away and ran out of the store. Two of Carroll’s friends have said she told them about the alleged attack soon afterward. She never informed police or anyone else until she recounted the story in a 2019 memoir and magazine excerpt. (The Associated Press typically does not name people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they come forward publicly, as Carroll did.)
WHAT DOES TRUMP SAY HAPPENED?
Nothing whatsoever. “She said that I did something to her that never took place. There was no anything,” Trump said when Carroll’s lawyers questioned him under oath in October. He denies even bumping into her at the store and has accused her of making up the story to sell her book. When her account was first published,…
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