People Magazine is slamming Donald Trump for what it calls his “disgusting, pathetic attempt to victimize” one of its reporters who accused him of sexual assault.
In a sharply worded statement, People editor-in-chief Jess Cagle called the reporter, Natasha Stoynoff, “a remarkable, ethical, honest and patriotic woman” who had come forward “because she felt it was her duty to make the public aware” of Trump’s attacks.
In a story for People published late Wednesday night, Stoynoff alleged that Trump had physically attacked her at Mar-a-Lago while she was writing an article on his one-year wedding anniversary to his wife, Melania.
“We walked into that room alone, and Trump shut the door behind us. I turned around, and within seconds he was pushing me against the wall and forcing his tongue down my throat,” Stoynoff wrote.
The Trump campaign told People the incident “never happened,” and there was “no merit or veracity to this fabricated story.”
On Thursday morning, Trump also took to Twitter to slam the story, writing, “Why didn’t the writer of the twelve year old article in People Magazine mention the ‘incident’ in her story. Because it did not happen!”
He hammered the story again at a rally later in West Palm Beach, Florida.
“Why wasn’t it part of the story?” Trump said, adding that Stoynoff’s allegations, if published, would have been “one of the biggest stories of the year” because of his celebrity.
“Take a look,” Trump said. “You take look, look at her, look at her words, you tell me what you think. I don’t think so.”
Cagle responded in no uncertain terms to Trump’s suggestion that the claim was fabricated.
“To assign any other motive is a disgusting, pathetic attempt to victimize her again,” he wrote. “We stand steadfastly by her, and are proud to publish her clear, credible account of what happened.”
Stoynoff’s story was published shortly after The New York Times and The Palm Beach Post published separate stories in which various women claimed Trump had touched or kissed them inappropriately.
Lawyers for Trump have called on the Times to retract its report, and campaign sources tell CNNMoney that the campaign is drafting lawsuits against both the Times and the Palm Beach Post.
Both the Times and the Post are standing by their stories, and legal experts have doubts that Trump will actually file such a suit.
The Trump campaign has not said whether or not it has plans to call on People Magazine to retract Stoynoff’s story, or whether it intends to sue the magazine.