11 May 2023 , 16:15
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Two of Donald Trump’s former White House staff have accused him of sexual harassment, after he was court-ordered to pay a victim $5million in damages - saying they saw "countless cases" of Trump's "impropriety."
Alyssa Farah Griffin and Stephanie Grisham, who both worked in communications for the former President, made their accusations after a jury found Trump liable for sexually assaulting writer E. Jean Carroll in a department store in the mid-1990s.
The panel awarded he $5 million (£3.9m) in damages for sexual assault and defamation and marked the first time a former US president has been branded, legally, as a sexual predator.
Farah Griffin, who quit as White House communications director in December 2020, claimed he had a pattern of behaving inappropriately with women.
Alyssa Farah Griffin walks the red carpet at the White House Correspondent's Association Dinner in 2023 (Nathan Posner/REX/Shutterstock)"I have countless cases of what I considered impropriety in the White House that I brought to the chief of staff because I thought the way he engaged with women was dangerous," Farah Griffin said while discussing the verdict on US television.
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She added she was not the only one to report Trump's behaviour to his chiefs of staff.
”Nothing that rises to this level [his abuse of Carroll] but things that I would consider improper and that I had a duty to report," she said.
Farah Griffin urged Americans to "pay attention" and for Republicans to "stop making apologies" for her former boss.
Stephanie Grisham was press secretary for First Lady Melania Trump (AFP/Getty Images) "When Donald Trump tells you who he is, believe him. We wanted to chalk it up to locker room talks in 2016. It was not locker room talk," she added, referring to the infamous 2005 Access Hollywood hot-mic recording of Trump talking about kissing and grabbing women without consent.
Stephanie Grisham, former Trump White House press secretary, said she too had reported Trump's actions towards a woman on her team to chiefs of staff.
She said the then-president would often comment on women's looks but "with this one staffer, it was it was really bad to the point that I was extremely uncomfortable."
Grisham claimed Trump would ask the employee to be on foreign trips "when it wasn't her turn."
E. Jean Carroll arrives at Manhattan federal court, (AP)She said: "He one time had one of my other deputies bring her back so that they could look at her ass is what he said to him.
"I did everything I could to keep her off of trips actually and to stay with her if she was with him alone because I was really nervous about what could happen and this was before I knew kind of any of the E. Jean Carroll allegations.
“I stupidly did know about the Access Hollywood video but maybe that was what made me you know, keep with her all the time."
Grisham said every senior staff member was aware of Trump's behaviour, but there was little they could do.
"I think at the end of the day, what could they do other than go in there and say, 'This isn't good, sir?'" she said. "And you know, Donald Trump will do what Donald Trump wants to do.”
Trump has so far not commented on the allegations.