Trump dismisses sex assault claims and slams ‘global plot’

WASHINGTON

Donald Trump has sarcastically dismissed women accusing him of sexual misconduct — even as two more came forward with lurid accounts — and denounced “an international political and media plot against me”.

Meanwhile, President Barack Obama warned that America’s democracy was at stake in the November 8 election because of the Republican.

As Trump spoke at a rally, Summer Zervos, an ex-contestant on his TV show The Apprentice came forward to accuse him of kissing, groping and thrusting his genitals at her during a meeting at a California hotel in 2007.

The Trump campaign said he vaguely remembered Zervos and that she continued to email his office for help after the show ended, but shot down her accusations.

Also, a former aspiring model, Kristin Anderson, told the Washington Post that Trump sidled up to her in a club in the 1990s, reached under her skirt and touched her vagina.

They were the latest in a stream of women accusing Trump of predatory sexual behaviour, adding to the woes of his now free-falling presidential bid.

The torrent was unleashed by the release last Friday of an audio from 2005 in which Trump bragged that he could get away with grabbing women’s crotches because he was famous.

“Lies, lies, lies,” Trump thundered at a rally in Greensboro, North Carolina, referring to sexual misconduct allegations reported by the New York Times and other media.

“I love those signs, ‘Women for Trump,’” he told another crowd later in Charlotte.

KISSED HER

“I actually think I’m doing well with women,” Trump said, as a smiling blond woman in an iridescent silver top hoisted one of the posters above her head.

In the latest Quinnipiac poll, the Republican candidate trails his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton among women voters by 20 points.

In Greensboro, Trump also had words for Jessica Leeds, who said he groped and kissed her as they sat next to each other on a plane in the 1980s.
“Believe me, she would not be my first choice. That I can tell you.”

Trump then targeted Carlos Slim, the Mexican billionaire who is the largest shareholder in the New York Times.

“The corrupt media is trying to do everything in their power to stop our movement,” he said.

“Now Carlos Slim as you know comes from Mexico. He’s given many millions of dollars to the Clintons and their initiative,” Trump said alluding to the Clinton Foundation.

Arturo Elias, Slim’s son-in-law and spokesman, said Slim has never met Donald Trump and “is not interested in his personal life in the slightest”.

In reference to Clinton’s accusation that Trump was stalking her during last Sunday’s debate, the bombastic Republican candidate told his supporters she had simply walked in front of him.

“When she walked in front of me, I wasn’t impressed,” he said, eliciting laughter.

Against a backdrop of rising drama and anger, Obama, campaigning for Clinton in Cleveland, said much was at stake in the election.

He blasted Trump as a dictator-in-the-making, but also voiced concern about how Trump’s legion of supporters might react to defeat.

“Tolerance is on the ballot,” Obama told a group of young voters in Ohio.

FINANCIAL POWERS

“Courtesy is on the ballot. Honesty is on the ballot. Equality is on the ballot. Kindness is on the ballot. All the progress we made in the last eight years is on the ballot,” the president said.

As Trump tanks in the polls, he has spent the last week claiming the media and a “global elite” are working against him.

“Hillary meets in secret with international banks to plot the destruction of the United States sovereignty in order to enrich these financial powers, her special interest friends and donors,” he told supporters in Florida.

Obama gave that claim short shrift on Friday. “C’mon man!” he said.

“This is somebody who... is now suggesting that if the election doesn’t go his way, it’s not because all the stuff he’s said, but it’s because it’s rigged and it’s a fraud.

“You don’t start complaining about the refs before the game’s even done. You just play the game, right?”

Obama’s speech was the second strike at Trump in as many days by the US presidential couple — after Michelle Obama caused a sensation with an impassioned takedown of the Republican nominee.

Clinton has no campaign rallies planned for coming days, leaving Trump to battle alone in a sea of swirling sexual assault allegations.

Many elected Republican officials, worried about their re-election prospects, have taken their distance from Trump.

Some, though, have since reversed their stance, citing fears that Clinton’s appointments as president would move the Supreme Court sharply to the left.