On Friday, October 8, 2016, the Washington Post released footage that showed Donald Trump boasting about acts of sexual assault during a conversation with Access Hollywood host Billy Bush.
The video was shocking it its own right, but what came after proved to be even more disturbing.
Several women came forward to accuse Trump of sexual assault, with some saying they were motivated to share their stories after hearing GOP operatives dismiss his comments as “locker room talk” that in no way represents Trump’s interactions with women.
The accusations started when Jessica Leeds claimed Trump put his hand up her skirt during a flight to New York in 1979, forcing her to push the real estate mogul away and relocate to a different section of the airplane.
Shortly thereafter several other women came forward with similar stories.
The alleged incidents took place over the course of several decades in locales all over the country, but they all had one thing in common:
In each account, the Republican presidential nominee, groped, harassed, and forced himself on women who wanted nothing more than to escape.
The latest allegation comes from a New York woman named Cathy Heller, who says that the footage of Trump and Bush brought her back to a deeply uncomfortable incident from her past.
Heller says she attended a Mother’s Day brunch at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in the late ’90s, when the candidate attempted to forcibly grope and kiss her.
“That’s him, that’s exactly how he acted, it happened to me,” Heller tells People magazine of her reaction to the infamous Buch footage.
“It drove me crazy. It’s not just locker room talk. That’s who he is. He is a guy who grabs women.”
Heller says that when she went to shake hands with Trump, he grabbed her and attempted to kiss her.
“He said ‘Oh, come on’ and he was angry,” Heller recalls.
“He really grabbed me and he was holding me very tight to kiss me on the mouth.”
She adds that she resisted, and nearly fell over as a result:
“He was strong,” she continues.
“And he really caught me off guard and off balance, literally, because I had these heels on which I don’t always wear.”
Heller adds:
“I was able to turn my head a little,” Heller says. “So he didn’t get my whole mouth.”
A relative who attended the event with Heller corroborates the story:
“I saw her moving back, trying to escape his grasp and he kept moving forward and it was almost like he was falling forward,” the unnamed witness says.
“And she turned around and said, ‘Oh my gosh, did you see what happened?’ and she was upset about it and it was in plain view.
“It was like, ‘This gross guy, who does he think he is, he was falling on top of her to kiss her and in front of everyone. How entitled does this guy think he is?”
Trump has yet to respond to this latest allegation, but it’s not hard to imagine what his reaction might be.
Last week, during a rally in Florida, Trump called his accusers liars, insulted their appearances, and accused of them of conspiring with Hillary Clinton.