Woman accusing Trump of misconduct subpoenas presidential campaign
October 17, 2017
WASHINGTON: A woman — who has said that US President Donald Trump groped her during a 2007 meeting — has subpoenaed his presidential campaign for any documents concerning similar allegations, according to a subpoena filed in New York State Supreme Court.
Summer Zervos — a former contestant on Trump’s reality TV show The Apprentice — sought all documents from his campaign pertaining to “any woman alleging that Donald J. Trump touched her inappropriately”, identifying nine by name, the subpoena said.
Trump has denied Zervos’ accusation in the past.
On Monday, asked about the subpoena at an impromptu White House news conference, Trump called it “totally fake news.”
“It’s just fake. It’s fake. It’s made-up stuff, and it’s disgraceful, what happens, but that happens in the — that happens in the world of politics,” he said.
The Trump campaign did not immediately return a request for comment on the subpoena.
Last October, shortly before the November 8 presidential election, Zervos held a news conference to say that Trump kissed her, touched her, and tried to get her to lie down on a bed with him during a meeting about a possible job.
The accusation came a week after a 2005 video emerged showing the Republican candidate bragging about groping and making unwanted sexual advances.
While Trump said at the time the video was just a talk and he had never behaved in that way, several women subsequently went public with allegations of sexual misconduct against the New York real estate magnate going back three decades.
Trump denied all the allegations.
Zervos sued Trump for defamation in New York State Supreme Court after he denied her account of their meeting and accused her and other women of lying.
The subpoena — part of that lawsuit — was served in March and entered into the court file in September.
Trump’s lawyers agreed to preserve the pertinent documents, but they are also trying to have the lawsuit dismissed or delayed.
“We served it simply to make sure that the documents get preserved,” Mariann Wang — one of Zervos’ lawyers — said in a phone interview on Monday.
BuzzFeed website first reported on the subpoena late on Sunday.
