People in glass Trump Towers shouldn’t throw stones — or, perhaps, throw around accusations of rape, as one Donald Trump did recently in his now infamous remarks suggesting that Mexican immigrants are a bunch of rapists.
A must-read story yesterday in The Daily Beast points out that Trump is not only a rape accuser of sorts, but someone who was once very publicly accused of rape — by his now-former wife Ivana Trump, who, in a deposition in her divorce case against the Donald in the early 90s, said that she’s been attacked one night by her then husband in a fit of rage, screaming at her and pulling out her hair before ripping off her clothes and raping her.
The Beast reports that, according to Lost Tycoon, a 1993 book about Trump by journalist Harry Hurt III, Ivana told her closest friends that “he raped me.” Later, though, in a statement she provided through Trump’s lawyers, and that was reprinted in the book as “A Notice to Readers,” Ivana backed away from the R-word, saying that
[a]s a woman, I felt violated, as the love and tenderness, which he normally exhibited towards me, was absent. I referred to this as a ‘rape,’ but I do not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.
Make of that what you will.
At the time, the Daily Beast notes, Trump declared the account in the book
incorrect and done by a guy without much talent … He is a guy that is an unattractive guy who is a vindictive and jealous person.
Very Trumpian.
But even more remarkable than this bizarre denial was the even Trumpier response that Michael Cohen, one of Trump’s lawyers, gave to the Daily Beast writer who asked him about the allegations:
You’re talking about the front-runner for the GOP, presidential candidate, as well as private individual who never raped anybody.
Evidently one cannot be a rapist if one is polling better than Jeb Bush.
Cohen continued:
And, of course, understand that by the very definition, you can’t rape your spouse.
As the Beast points out, Cohen is completely wrong here. Not only is marital rape illegal in New York state now; it was illegal in New York state in 1989, the date of the alleged rape.
Perhaps sensing he wasn’t getting anywhere with the “you can’t rape your spouse” angle, “Trump’s lawyer then changed tactics,” the Beast reports,
lobbing insults and threatening a lawsuit if a story was published.
“I will make sure that you and I meet one day while we’re in the courthouse. And I will take you for every penny you still don’t have. And I will come after your Daily Beast and everybody else that you possibly know,” Cohen said. “So I’m warning you, tread very fucking lightly, because what I’m going to do to you is going to be fucking disgusting. You understand me?”
“You write a story that has Mr. Trump’s name in it, with the word ‘rape,’ and I’m going to mess your life up…for as long as you’re on this frickin’ planet…you’re going to have judgments against you, so much money, you’ll never know how to get out from underneath it,” he added.
Someone’s a bit grouchy.
Cohen continued, telling the Beast that
there is nothing reasonable about you wanting to write a story about somebody’s usage of the word ‘rape,’ when she’s talking [about] she didn’t feel emotionally satisfied.”
“Though there’s many literal senses to the word, if you distort it, and you put Mr. Trump’s name there onto it, rest assured, you will suffer the consequences. So you do whatever you want. You want to ruin your life at the age of 20? You do that, and I’ll be happy to serve it right up to you,” he added.
Given that the Beast ran the story, and we’re talking about it now, it kind of, sort of, appears that Cohen’s Trumpian lawyering backfired a little bit. And that’s a very good thing, because this is a story that needs to be re-aired.
Not to be outdone in the race to the bottom Mike Huckabee made an incredibly callous comment referencing the holocaust just recently.
I can’t believe Jeb Bush is looking like the most reasonable of the bunch.
Huckabeast is doubling down on that comment too. Today he claimed all the Jewish people totally agreed with his comment.
Not that it’s a surprise coming from a guy who raised a dog torturer and murderer and is friends with the Duggars but thinks Beyoncé is a bad role model and damaging girls because she shows too much leg.
And his response to rape in the military is “What do you expect when you put men and women together?”
http://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/331907383771148288
I read somewhere (of course, can’t remember where) that at this time in the last Presidential election cycle, Michele Bachmann was the Republican frontrunner. So it means zip at this point, but the press love it because it makes the election seem exciting, plus they can always count on Trump to say something inflammatory, which gets pageviews.
Re the lawyer’s “apology”: you know, somebody who completely loses control over what comes out of his mouth just because he hears something that “stuns”, “shocks” or “angers” him is not likely to be a very good lawyer.
I know this is neither relevant nor adult, but I very frequently STILL have a laugh at the name Trump – which is vernacular for ‘fart’ in England.
So when Ivana was married to DT her name literally meant ‘I want a fart’!
@katz: Well, he’s got my vote /sarcasm /baaaarrrfff
From Cohen’s apology:
“As an attorney, husband and father there are many injustices that offend me but nothing more than charges of rape or racism..”
When you think about it, that is one of the most ignorant, privileged things I have have ever heard. This guy, deep down, feels that some of the most pernicious evils in the world are… *accusations* of rape and racism.
Right off the top of my head I can think of two things that are much more offensive… but somehow he manages to wedge his foot even deeper into his mouth:
“They hit me at my core.”
Really? Charges of rape and racism are the two things that *hit him at his core*? His “core” sounds like a very, very ugly place.
Ivana responds to CNN:
“I have recently read some comments attributed to me from nearly 30 years ago at a time of very high tension during my divorce from Donald. The story is totally without merit,”
I think we all need o trust women.
Tilikum,
Notice that she doesn’t say the story is not true.
@Tilikum:
As the writer of the Daily Beast article says,
So which version do you decide to trust? Personally, I see a much better reason to trust the original story, and to distrust the current one.
Whatever happened between Donald and Ivanna, how does that justify Cohen’s comments? Try harder.
Again, I choose to trust women.
“It is true,” Cohen added. “You cannot rape your spouse. And there’s very clear case law.”
—
Dear god let’s hope these two are not lawyers, and don’t even play them on tv.
@Tanya:
…
Er, you do know that Cohen is one of Trump’s lawyers, right?
PS, apparently Cohen made an “appology”. Per huffPo:
Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s lawyer who defended the business mogul against rape allegations by telling The Daily Beast “you can’t rape your spouse,” issued an apology on Tuesday.
“As an attorney, husband and father there are many injustices that offend me but nothing more than charges of rape or racism,” Cohen said in a statement to CNN. “They hit me at my core. Rarely am I surprised by the press, but the gall of this particular reporter to make such a reprehensible and false allegation against Mr. Trump truly stunned me. In my moment of shock and anger, I made an inarticulate comment — which I do not believe — and which I apologize for entirely.”
Cohen had some choice words for The Daily Beast, saying he planned to “come after” the publication.
“So I’m warning you, tread very f—ing lightly, because what I’m going to do to you is going to be f—ing disgusting. You understand me?” Cohen said, according to CNN.
—
He’s going to do something “f’ing disgusting”, if they do their job. umkay.
Trump’s campaign manager crawled out of whatever disgusting cesspool he wallows in to comment.
“Mr. Trump didn’t know of his comments but disagrees with them.”
Seems important to specify which parts he disagrees with.
“Michael Cohen is a corporate employee and is not affiliated with the campaign in any way.”
Quickly! Under the bus with him!
As a woman, I say Cohen is a piece of shit rape apologist.
Kirby – nope, just found that out now. I sadly read teh article David linked to, rather than David’s article, so didn’t know he’d already made my comment.s meh it happens! 🙂
As a woman, I agree with WWTH.
@Tanya:
Fun times. As I get older, I somehow keep getting shocked out how actual real human adults behave in the actual, real adult world, even ones with actual, real jobs. It’d incredible to think that an actual lawyer doesn’t know about a law that’s been around for thirty years.
@delphi_ote:
You gotta wonder why he bothers. Trump himself has struct out a bold campaign of horrid comments, why throw out a dude making an equally horrid, though horrid in a different way, one?
Cohen sounds like an MRA’s wet dream – a lawyer who believes that a rape accusation is worse than rape, accusations of racism worse than racism.
I agree with WWTH; and I’m a white straight bloke so you have to believe me; it’s the law.
[Also, I invented everything]