More than three decades ago, when she was a businesswoman at a paper company, Leeds said she sat beside Trump in the first-class cabin of a flight to New York. They had never met before.
About 45 minutes after takeoff, she recalled, Trump lifted the armrest and began to touch her.
Trump’s claim that his crude words had never turned into actions was similarly infuriating to a woman watching on Sunday night in Ohio: Rachel Crooks.
They should not, say Leeds and Crooks, whose stories have never been made public before. And their accounts echo those of other women who have previously come forward, like Temple Taggart, a former Miss Utah, who said Trump kissed her on the mouth more than once when she was a 21-year-old pageant contestant.
In a phone interview on Tuesday night, Trump, highly agitated, denied every one of the women’s claims.
Leeds was 38 at the time and living in Connecticut. She had been seated in coach. But a flight attendant invited her to take an empty seat in first class, she said. That seat was beside Trump, who did not yet own a fleet of private aircraft, records show. He introduced himself and shook her hand. They exchanged pleasantries, and Trump asked her if she was married. She was divorced, and told him so.
“I was angry and shook up,” she recalled Tuesday.
She recalled bumping into Trump at a charity event in New York about two years later, and said he seemed to recall her, insulting her with a crude remark.
They said they were sickened by what they heard. “It made me shake,” said Linda Ross, a neighbour and friend who spoke with Leeds about the interaction about six months ago. Like several of Leeds’ friends, Ross encouraged her to tell her story to the news media. Leeds had resisted until Sunday’s debate, which she watched with Ross.
When Trump denied having ever sexually assaulted women, in response to a question from Anderson Cooper of CNN, Ross said she immediately looked at Leeds in disbelief. “Now we know he lied straight up,” Ross recalled saying.
“His behaviour is deep-seated in his character,” Leeds wrote in the message.
Days later, Crooks said, Trump, who had recently married Melania, came into the office and requested her phone number. When she asked why he needed it, Trump told her he intended to pass it along to his modelling agency. Crooks was skeptical, but relented because of Trump’s influence over her company. She never heard from the modelling agency.
During the rest of her year working at the office, she made a point of ducking out of sight every time Trump came into view. When employees were invited to the Trump Organization Christmas party, she declined, wanting to avoid any other encounters with him.
“I was upset that it had happened to other people, but also took some comfort in knowing I wasn’t the only one he had done it to,” said Crooks, who reached out to the Times to share her story.
Both Leeds and Crooks say they support Hillary Clinton’s campaign for president, and Crooks has made contributions of less than $200 to Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
Crooks was initially reluctant to go public with her story, but felt compelled to talk about her experience.