Talk:Donald Trump sexual misconduct allegations

Attorney Lisa Bloom's involvement

This article should include the now extremely relevant information coming to light about attorney Lisa Bloom's role in offering payment to women who agreed to come forward with sexual misconduct allegations against Donald Trump. This is not meant to discredit anyones allegations, but it's highly relevant considering she is a high profile attorney that bribed accusers, and that she did it in the months leading up to the 2016 US Presidential election. Sources:

http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/365068-exclusive-prominent-lawyer-sought-donor-cash-for-two-trump-accusers

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/12/15/attorney-lisa-bloom-sought-to-line-up-paydays-for-women-accusing-trump-sexual-misconduct-report.html

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/lisa-bloom-trump-accusers-paid-article-1.3701922 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:84:4600:6CFE:6C2E:A313:F30C:4428 (talk) 20:53, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

More about money, particularly David Brock's involvement from New York Times. Not sure where this stuff should be included, if at all. A new section on Jill Harth's friend might be needed. She was going to come forward to bolster Harth's story; she asked for $2 million, was offered $750,000, butnever came forward until her story ended up in The Hill.LM2000 (talk) 09:58, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Bannon raises the accusation of rape of a 13-year-old girl

Two RS...

Steve Bannon raises sexual misconduct claims against Donald Trump involving 13-year-old girl. He stepped down as White House chief strategist in August.

He criticised Ivanka over how she handled the US Senate election in Alabama in which Roy Moore, whom Bannon backed, lost following accusations of sexual misconduct with teenagers. Ivanka said during the campaign: "there is a special place in hell for people who prey on children".

"Bannon told the magazine: "What about the allegations about her dad and that 13-year-old?" –referring to a claim by a woman in California who had filed a suit alleging that Trump and billionaire Jeffrey Epstein had raped her in 1994, when she was an aspiring model. The charge was unproven and later dropped. Trump denies the many claims of sexual misconduct against him."

This is an old charge, but when we have Bannon raising the issue, it's more than just National Enquirer stuff. -- BullRangifer (talk) 05:47, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

See massive RfC here. It was more than just National Enquirer stuff then. If you want to run another RfC, I can't stop you, although I (and I suspect many others) would strongly object to a rehash on the basis of one Bannon comment. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:34, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

References

Stephanie Clifford

- this is hardly an abuse, but bribing someone to stay quiet is definitely a "misconduct". Should this be included on the page? My very best wishes (talk) 22:30, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

That particular story is starting to look like fake news. With everyone on all sides including Clifford denying it. [1]and [2] PackMecEng (talk) 00:23, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Of course she denies it. But I would rather not unilaterally include this. My very best wishes (talk) 01:10, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

It may be real but I don't think it belongs here. The covering up of a consensual affair is a bit different from the allegations here. Little about Gennifer Flowers is on the Bill Clinton sexual misconduct allegations article, for good reason.LM2000 (talk) 01:16, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

ZeroHedge is not a RS, but of course we could use the dubious right-wing GOP apology site Fox to document the denial. The content is based on very RS and is certainly within the scope of this article. The story was broken by the conservative, right-wing, Wall Street Journal, and has been covered by numerous RS. I see no policy-based reasons for excluding it. Other stuff is a false argument. -- BullRangifer (talk) 05:18, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

I have restored a much improved version. It's properly sourced, NPOV, and conforms to BLP. Now respect WP:PRESERVE by improvement, but not deletion. -- BullRangifer (talk) 05:42, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

I don't think sourcing is the issue, it's that this would have been a consensual affair and this article is about sexual misconduct.LM2000 (talk) 05:45, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Adultery and bribery/hush money are misconduct, especially repugnant when the alleged affair occurred while Melania was at home pregnant or with their new baby. It's a sexual misconduct scandal, and a scandal certainly qualifies. -- BullRangifer (talk) 06:13, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Agree with that, and it was covered in multiple RS. The only question is how this and possibly other similar materials should be included on WP pages. My very best wishes (talk) 17:42, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

I can't say I feel too passionately about inclusion of this one either way but I don't think it meshes well with the other allegations in this article. His extramarital affairs have been well documented over the years, if we start documenting them I fear it will distract from the reason this article was created in the first place.LM2000 (talk) 06:26, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Agree with LM2000. This is out of this article's scope—the article is not meant to include any alleged misconduct that has a small consensual sex element. The main offenses alleged are the hush money and the cheating, in that order, not that he had sex with a porn star (which is completely legal). PRESERVE is not meant to protect disputed content added without consensus. I'm removing the content and it should not be re-added in any form without talk page consensus per the ArbCom remedies in effect on this page. If there is not enough participation to reach a consensus to include (3–2 would not be a consensus for something this contentious, in my opinion), go to RfC. I'll advertise at Donald Trump. ―Mandruss ☎ 13:48, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

It seems like "misconduct about sex allegation", not "sexual misconduct allegation" - so oppose inclusion in this article. Galobtter (pingó mió) 15:04, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Came here after seeing the link at Talk:Donald Trump. My view is that the Stephanie Clifford affair/"hush money" has no business being in this article. It is absolutely not "sexual misconduct" at all. Some people view having affairs and trying to keep them a secret as morally questionable, and certainly doing so disqualifies an individual from being able to lecture others on their morality; nevertheless, it is a perfectly normal behavior that should not be described as "misconduct" by Wikipedia. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:10, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

No, paying money to keep someone silent and hide your behavior from electorate is not "a perfectly normal behavior" by any reasonable standards, and it's not WP, but RS describe this as misconduct. If that was a normal behavior, he would have no reason to pay money for hiding it.My very best wishes (talk) 17:16, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

@Galobtter: I don't think paying "hush money" is misconduct either. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:19, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, that too. Galobtter (pingó mió) 15:24, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

@LM2000. You tell: "His extramarital affairs have been well documented over the years". Where this appears on WP pages? I am not sufficiently familiar with US politics. My very best wishes (talk) 15:38, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

This comes down to where to have this content, per our job to document the "sum total of human knowledge" (Jimbo) as reported in RS. It's now in the Stormy Daniels article, where it certainly belongs, but since it involves Trump and a political cover-up/hush money, it needs to be somewhere in one of his political articles. It seems logical to include it here, rather than having a separate article documenting his history of adultery. We should just expand the scope. Maybe we can have a much shorter mention? Not mentioning it is not a legitimate option.

Whenever we edit here, we must remember that one of our jobs is to place more weight on including content than on excluding it. Tweaking the inclusion criteria of an existing article is sometimes the easiest way. -- BullRangifer (talk) 17:53, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

I would certainly support that. It seems that adultery is not generally considered in English a "sexual misconduct", but paying hash money does make it a misconduct. I think that briefly noticing such affairs on various pages is required by WP:NPOV if they receive significant coverage in RS (such as that one). My very best wishes (talk) 18:02, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

There is no policy basis for your "sum total of human knowledge" argument. Please stop asserting a general, vague, unexplained philosophical Jimbocomment as having any weight in these decisions. Similarly I would like to see policy support for "one of our jobs is to place more weight on including content than on excluding it"; absent that it's nothing more than one editor's view of what Wikipedia should be. In contrast, there is plenty of policy basis for "not mentioning it", and we decide every day to omit things reported in RS, for any of a multitude of policy-based reasons. I oppose any content in this article for the reasons already stated, and what to do at other articles is not a matter for discussion on this page. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:29, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer and My very best wishes: Neither extramarital affairs, nor attempting to cover them up with "hush money", are "misconduct". Until there is enough material to support Personal life of Donald Trump, the only appropriate place to put this stuff is "family and personal life" of the main BLP. Trying to put the matter in this article would actually be a WP:BLPVIO, because it would be alleging "misconduct" where none legally exists. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:11, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Legality does not matter. It only matters what sources tell. They make connection with "sexual misconduct" (see here): Trump has denied several allegations of sexual misconduct in the past, and spokeswoman Hope Hicks said in 2016 that it was “absolutely, unequivocally” untrue that Clifford had a relationship with Trump. My very best wishes (talk) 22:21, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Very true. Misconduct doesn't have to be a legal matter, but is related to societal norms, which then affect vulnerability to blackmail. (I suspect that there are still some US states where it's still illegal.) It is societal standards which determine "misconduct", and in American society, and most others, adultery is considered wrong, even if it's not illegal. That's why the need for "hush money", otherwise it was (assumably) some of the most expensive sex he's ever paid for.

Such (hidden) affairs also expose him to blackmail, and why it's an especially serious matter for a politician. We don't want to elect blackmailable politicians! Bill Clinton's affair with Lewinski made him vulnerable, and he paid the price. It was the "hidden" nature that got him, because he lied about it.

Trump's alleged hidden affairs, especially the alleged multiple ones alleged in Saint Petersburg and Moscow, have been described as "blackmailable" offenses by paying bribes and engaging in sexual activities in Russia, which all make him currently peculiarly vulnerable.

That ties into the allegations that he is actually being blackmailed right now, IOW, that the Kremlin has enough "embarrassing material" on Trump "to be able to blackmail him if they so wished", but it has "promised not to use" it "as leverage, given high levels of voluntary co-operation forthcoming from his team". -- BullRangifer (talk) 00:21, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Agree. People in the US who think he is going to impose serious sanctions on Russia will be disappointed. But most of this content probably belong to other pages. My very best wishes (talk) 00:45, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

@My very best wishes: The NY Daily News article you linked to does NOT label the affair OR the payoff as "misconduct", or even "alleged" misconduct. Unless you can find cast iron sources that explicitly do this, it would be a BLP violation to add it to the article. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:55, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

More to the point, "sexual misconduct" or even "alleged sexual misconduct". This is not the Bad stuff Donald Trump has been accused of article. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:16, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

This source and all other sources discuss the episode in connection with the "sexual misconduct allegations". Hence I do not see any reason why we can't do it here. This is something nearly all RS on the subject do. Therefore, this is not a WP:SYN. We simply say what RS say. Why can't we simply follow the sources? My very best wishes (talk) 19:31, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

We should be, and the sources do not use that language. It just does not fit the scope of this article. PackMecEng (talk) 19:53, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

If sources choose to discuss sexual misconduct allegations and other misconduct allegations in the same articles (that is disputed in the preceding comment, but it's beside my point), that doesn't mean we have to. Our topic divisions do not have to agree with theirs and very often do not. If you seek to change the title and scope of this article, the mechanism for that is RfC. But the title and scope need to remain in agreement. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:05, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

This is not about different allegations simply being included in the same articles. All RS treat this case and his sexual misconduct allegations as something closely connected, something that needs to be discussed together (that is what these sources do). I am not sure why you are so much against including this, but whatever. My very best wishes (talk) 21:09, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Articles that discuss Trump's actual misconduct discuss many other things, but they are also outside of the scope of this article. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:58, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

You missed the point. This is not "another thing", but something closely related to the subject per multiple RS. For example, it is entirely appropriate to mention peptides in a page about proteins. My very best wishes (talk) 18:03, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

I didn't "miss" your point. Your point was wrong. "Closely related" is not supported by a single reliable source. This article is about sexual misconduct, and neither having an affair, nor paying an inducement to keep it quiet, are examples of sexual misconduct, and no reliable sources suggest otherwise. Repeatedly stating such misinterpretations will not make it so. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:25, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Scjessey, you just provided the best evidence of misconduct, the actions and guilty conscience of the perpetrator: "paying an inducement to keep it quiet". If it wasn't misconduct, why hide it? -- BullRangifer (talk) 05:32, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: Knowledge of the affair would provide ammunition to his opponents, as well as being personally awkward. But trying to hide it still isn't a form of misconduct, and there are no sources supporting the notion that it is. This is the wrong article. It should be in the main BLP. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:20, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Seriously? What world do you live in? Morally, ethically, in some places legally, and by most standards of decency, it's considered very bad behavior (misconduct). Maybe you're using a different definition of the word than the rest of us. -- BullRangifer (talk) 16:11, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

If you are going to extend the meaning of "misconduct" to include nebulous examples of personal moral and ethical behaviors, as you seem to be doing, then you are going way beyond the meaning of the word as Wikipedia sees it. Some religious (or seriously uptight) people might argue that these things are "misconduct", but Wikipedia doesn't and US law doesn't. I will agree that these revelations are salacious, but not misconduct. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:39, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

I am just noting the current societal norms in the United States. Even in Hollywood, adultery is often cause for divorce. Even libertines, bless their souls, know that the rest of society doesn't approve of their behavior. As noted above, you provided the best evidence of misconduct, the actions and guilty conscience of the perpetrator led them to pay "an inducement to keep it quiet". If it wasn't misconduct, why hide it? That's why it's a blackmailable affair, and hence the desire to keep it quiet.

Even Putin treats Trump's alleged sexual affairs in Russia that way. The Trump–Russia dossier alleges that Trump was compromised with the blackmailable offenses of paying bribes and engaging in sexual activities in Russia. According to the dossier, as noted by multiple RS, the blackmail threat is active and conditionally mitigated by continued cooperation from Trump's side: Alleged, that the Kremlin has enough "embarrassing material" on Trump "to be able to blackmail him if they so wished", but it has "promised not to use" it "as leverage, given high levels of voluntary co-operation forthcoming from his team". That indicates that the alleged blackmail is active and working to Putin's advantage. Now you know why such affairs are indeed "misconduct" and are hidden. -- BullRangifer (talk) 04:49, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

I am sorry, but all RS in this edit consider them to be very closely related, even appearing in the same phrase ("Trump has denied several allegations of sexual misconduct in the past, and spokeswoman Hope Hicks said in 2016 that it was “absolutely, unequivocally” untrue that Clifford had a relationship with Trump"), and they are related based on any reasonable understanding of the subject. It is indeed like someone strenuously arguing that nothing about peptides should be included on a page about proteins. Yes, striktly speaking, peptides and proteins are not the same. My very best wishes (talk) 18:41, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

If you really think those quotes legitimize your case, you must have some problem with reading comprehension. Your arguments are neither policy-based, nor sense-based, so I'm not wasting more time with you on this. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:20, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

• Do not include - not an allegation re Sexual misconduct " sexual harassment, sexual assault, sexual abuse, and any conduct of a sexual nature that is without consent". So it's WP:OFFTOPIC for this article. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 01:50, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

References