NEW YORK – A woman who says Donald Trump quietly abused her on an airliner in the late 1970s testified on Tuesday in favor of the writer who alleges a flirtatious 1996 encounter with the future president turned ends in a violent sexual assault.
Jessica Leeds, 81, of Asheville, North Carolina, said Trump touched her with what appeared to be “40 million hands.” She joined other witnesses who supported the testimony of E. Jean Carroll, an advice columnist who publicly aired her claims against Trump in 2019, when she published an autobiography. Trump has repeatedly denied those allegations, saying Carroll lied to sell books and discredit him.
Witnesses were expected to back up Carroll’s testimony, spanning three days and through Monday, that Trump raped her in the dressing room of one of midtown Manhattan’s luxury department stores.
Lisa Birnbach, a longtime friend of Carroll’s, testified that Carroll called her, emotional and hyperventilated, minutes after meeting Trump to tell him what had happened. She said she told him that Carroll had been raped and urged her to turn herself in to the police, but Carroll refused, leading them to argue before Birnbach agreed not to talk about it anymore.
Leeds said she was in her 30s and working in sales when she was asked by a flight attendant on a daytime flight from Dallas or Atlanta to New York to sit in the only seat first class cabin aisle empty.
“The gentleman sitting by the window introduced himself as Donald Trump,” he said.
The conversation between the two was mostly forgettable, Leeds recalls, over a nice meal, before “Trump suddenly decides to kiss and grope me.”
“There was no conversation. It was like out of nowhere. It was like a struggle. He was trying to kiss me, trying to pull me towards him. He was grabbing my boobs. It was like if he had 40 million hands. It was like a fight between the two of them,” he recalls.
Leeds said the altercation ended when he realized no staff on the plane came to the rescue and Trump seemed to become more aggressive.
Rogelio Mora-Tagle was in court and explained what former President Donald Trump told the judge.