Trump accuser said she ‘laughed out loud’ when she heard him again deny her assault allegation
CNN
Jessica Leeds, who previously accused Donald Trump of sexual assault and was a trial witness in a high-profile case against the former president, said Monday that she “laughed out loud” when she heard he recently disputed her allegation and said she “would not have been the chosen one.”
Jessica Leeds, who previously accused Donald Trump of sexual assault and was a trial witness in a high-profile case against the former president, said Monday that she “laughed out loud” when she heard he recently disputed her allegation and said she “would not have been the chosen one.” “I laughed out loud. I couldn’t believe that he was using that word like some sort of cult figure,” Leeds told CNN’s Anderson Cooper on “AC360.” Leeds was one of the first women to come forward during the 2016 presidential campaign to allege that Trump sexually assaulted her. She said she was seated in first class on an airplane next to Trump in the 1970s when he suddenly began groping her. Leeds said she fought off Trump and moved to the back of the airplane. “I was not the first, of course I was not the last. But there have been enough so that he doesn’t remember,” Leeds told Cooper Monday. Asked about Leeds’ comments, Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung again denied Trump had ever met Leeds and said that “whatever fable she’s trying to peddle is only meant to interfere in the election and distract from” Vice President Kamala Harris, his Democratic rival. Leeds had been called to testify during Trump’s sexual abuse and defamation trial last year brought by E. Jean Carroll, who accused the former president of assaulting her in a luxury department store dressing room in the spring of 1996. She was one of two women Carroll’s lawyers called to allege Trump had a modus operandi of sexually assaulting women and then attacking their appearance and credibility when the allegations became public.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth risked compromising sensitive military information that could have endangered US troops through his use of Signal to discuss attack plans, a Pentagon watchdog said in an unclassified report released Thursday. It also details how Hegseth declined to cooperate with the probe.

Two top House lawmakers emerged divided along party lines after a private briefing with the military official who oversaw September’s attack on an alleged drug vessel that included a so-called double-tap strike that killed surviving crew members, with a top Democrat calling video of the incident that was shared as part of the briefing “one of the most troubling things” he has seen as a lawmaker.











