'Like a twisted game' Ex-model says Trump groped her on visit with Epstein

A former model who says she met Donald Trump through the late sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein has accused the former president of groping and sexually touching her in an incident in Trump Tower in 1993, in what she believed was a "twisted game" between the two men.

- Stephanie Kirchgaessner & Lucy Osborne

Stacey Williams, who worked as a professional model in the 1990s, said she met Trump in 1992 at a Christmas party after being introduced to him by Epstein, who she believed was a good friend of the then New York property developer. Williams said Epstein was interested in her and the two casually dated for a period of a few months.

"It became very clear then that he and Donald were really, really good friends and spent a lot of time together," Williams said.

The alleged groping occurred some months later, in the late winter or early spring of 1993, when Epstein suggested during a walk they were on that he and Williams visit Trump at Trump Tower. Epstein was later convicted of sex offences and killed himself in prison in 2019.

Moments after they arrived, she alleges, Trump greeted her, pulled her toward him and started groping her. She said he put his hands "all over my breasts" as well as her waist and her buttocks. She said she froze because she was "deeply confused" about what was happening. At the same time, she believed she saw the two men smiling at each other.

Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary for Donald Trump's campaign, provided a statement denying the allegations, which said in part: "These accusations, made by a former activist for Barack Obama and announced on a [Kamala] Harris campaign call two weeks before the election, are unequivocally false. It's obvious this fake story was contrived by the Harris campaign." Williams says Trump sent her agent a postcard via courier later in 1993, an aerial view of Mar-a-Lago, his Palm Beach residence and resort.

She shared it with the Guardian. In his handwriting-using what appears to be his usual black Sharpie pen he wrote: "Stacey - Your home away from home. Love Donald".