Stephanie Grisham agrees that people who oppose Donald Trump, including Republicans, are 'scum'
Sign up for the daily Inside Washington email for exclusive US coverage and analysis sent to your inbox
Get our free Inside Washington email
The US Justice Department’s investigation into the origins of FBI special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian election hacking in 2016, instigated by Donald Trump’s attorney general William Barr and widely seen as a retaliatory measure to explore “deep state” liberal bias, is now “a criminal inquiry”, according to reports.
The president finds himself under renewed pressure as lawyers for Summer Zervos, a former candidate on his reality show The Apprentice who has accused Mr Trump of sexual assault, say their client has evidence to corroborate her claim that he attacked her in a Los Angeles hotel room in 2007.
The calendar records, filed in Ms Zervos’ defamation lawsuit, show Mr Trump was scheduled to be at the Beverly Hills Hotel in California on 21 December, 2007, in the timeframe when she claims Mr Trump made unwanted advances at that hotel.
She said he kissed and groped her, despite her objections, at what she thought would be a professional dinner, and then invited her to meet him at his nearby golf course the next morning. The calendar records show he was scheduled there the morning after his arrival at the hotel.
Mr Trump’s calendar doesn’t include anything about a meeting with Ms Zervos. But her lawyer, Mariann Wang, wrote that the documents “strongly corroborate” Ms Zervos’ account — and indicate that Mr Trump was lying in a 2016 statement that said he “never met her at a hotel.”
Mr Trump's lawyer Marc Kasowitz said on Thursday that Ms Zervos’ claims are “entirely meritless and not corroborated by any documents.”
Trump impeachment: Who's who in the Ukraine scandal
Show all 26
Ms Zervos, a California restaurateur who was on The Apprentice in 2006, was among more than a dozen women who came forward during Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign with allegations of sexual misconduct. Both she and Mr Trump are Republicans.
He called the women “liars” trying to harm him with “100 percent fabricated” stories, and he retweeted a message specifically calling Ms Zervos’ claims “a hoax.” He also issued a statement denying her allegations, including the denial of meeting her at a hotel.
Ms Zervos had approached lawyers in 2011 and sent Fox News an August 2015 email about her allegation, according to the filing.
“Trump Hit On Me,” read the email’s subject line. Sent two months into Mr Trump’s presidential campaign, the message said he “invited me to a hotel room under the guise of working for him. He had a different agenda.”
Ms Zervos is seeking a retraction, an apology and damages.
In her lawsuit, Ms Zervos said Mr Trump also kissed her unexpectedly at his office in Trump Tower in December of 2007, before the alleged California encounter.
Thursday’s court filing doesn’t include any calendar items related to that alleged encounter, but it does include emails from that autumn between Ms Zervos and Mr Trump’s secretary where they discuss a potential lunch date in New York.
Support free-thinking journalism and attend Independent events
Meanwhile, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway is also in trouble after threatening a Washington Examiner reporter who asked her about her husband, a frequent critic of President Trump, prompting the journalist in question to publish a transcript of their phone call.
Additional reporting by AP. Please allow a moment for our live blog to load
A little on the 2020 Democrats, as Ohio congressman Tim Ryan drops out of the race having made very little impression at all and failed to qualify for any of the debates since Miami and Detroit.
This was an especially brutal response.
Hawaii congresswoman and Russian asset Tulsi Gabbard has meanwhile said she will not seek re-election to the House next year but remains committed to her presidential run.
She appeared on Sean Hannity's show on Fox last night to attack the impeachment inquiry - two very unusual things for a Democrat to be doing.
Bernie Sanders has meanwhile announced he backs the decriminalisation of marijuana, sending out a tweet introducing his policy at precisely 4.20 yesterday afternoon - a nice touch to delight the stoner community.
A little more on the Summer Zervos allegations against Trump: his private calendar places him at the Beverly Hills Hotel on the same day the alleged victim says the assault took place.
Trump says he will attend Game 5 of baseball's World Series on Sunday between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros if it's needed but won't throw out the customary first pitch because doing so would require donning "a lot of heavy armour" that might make him look "too heavy".
Here's Obama doing it, for context.
In his stead, the Nationals have opted for celebrity chef and Trump critic Jose Andres, which says it all.
Trump is hitting out at Tim Ryan after the Ohio congressman announced he was dropping out of the 2020 race.
The president attacked him and segued into assailing another sitting congressman, Eric Swalwell, who also ran for president this election cycle but was one of the first major candidates to bow out.
Tim Keller, the Democratic mayor of Albuquerque, New Mexico, has sent the Trump campaign a bill for precisely $211,175.94 (£164,671.24) to cover the costs of security arrangement when he visited the city last month, telling the president to pay up because his “resources for law enforcement are critical and limited.”
The president’s campaign stop in the Albuquerque area cost the taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars, including over 1500 hours of police overtime that was required by the campaign.
We are asking the Trump campaign to pay our taxpayers back.
How about a little celebrity criticism of the administration?
NBA legend Charles Barkley says vice president Mike Pence should "shut the hell up" over Big Basketball doing business with China.
Delusional rapper Kanye West has meanwhile explained the reason he sported a MAGA cap and endorsed Trump at the White House was to "own the libs" (or some such nonsense to that effect) while Bruce Springsteen has said the president "doesn’t understand what it means to be American".
Trump is tweeting an apparent quote from Fox anchor Lou Dobbs that heaps praise onto himself as “an absolutely historic President”.
This comes just after he tweets out a thinly veiled threat to Turkey that he'll reimpose sanctions on the country if it were to go against a US-brokered ceasefire:
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies