Trump and Casablancas-Two peas in a pod

Hi folks,

Remember that article I wrote a couple weeks ago about Donald Trump, and the weird, illicit and possibly illegal modeling agency he owns? Remember his bizarre bromance with avowed child predator John Casablancas?

It’s been getting some attention-and Michael Gross, who probably knows more about the modeling and fashion industries than any other living human being, has come out with a new article that you really need to read

Inside Donald Trump’s One-Stop Parties: Attendees Recall Cocaine and Very Young Models

The morals of Donald J. Trump, as a longtime model lover and then a modeling agency owner, were forged in another era, one in which young girls were used as a sort of currency between men doing business with one another. It’s not a time that Trump, who once blew up gossip reporters’ phones to dish on his own sexual exploits, real and imagined, is eager to remember now. But after I wrote for The Daily Beast earlier this year about the parties he hosted in the 1990s where “his wealthy friends, high-rollers from his Atlantic City casinos, and potential Trump condominium buyers could meet models” from second-tier agencies, several men who attended those parties at the Plaza Hotel emerged to share scandalous specifics about Trump’s presence and behavior at events where illegal drugs and young women were passed around and used.

Huh, imagine that!

One of the two men I spoke with, a fashion photographer, requested anonymity because he has fathered several children since his Trump days and doesn’t want his past dredged up. “There’s no upside for me,” he says. The other man… well, you’ll read his words. Both confirmed that Trump, as I’ve reported, used to host parties in suites at the Plaza Hotel when he owned it, where young women and girls were introduced to older, richer men. This is hardly aberrant behavior in the modeling business. Indeed, it is standard operating procedure. The attraction for the men “was young girls assuming they’d get somewhere” by joining the party, the photographer says, “Of course, it never happens.” [...] The girls were as young as 15, he says, and “over their heads, they had no idea, and they ended up in situations. There were always dramas because the men threw money and drugs at them to keep them enticed. It’s based on power and dominating girls who can’t push back and can be discarded. There’s always someone to pick them back up. Nobody wants to call home and say ‘Help me.’” Trump would “go from room to room,” said the photographer, who added that “I was there to party myself. It was guys with younger girls, sex, a lot of sex, a lot of cocaine, top-shelf liquor” but no smoking. Trump didn’t approve of cigarettes.

Well then, thank you daddy Trump for making sure your 15-year-old party favors didn’t ruin their developing little lungs with cigarette smoke after getting fucked by the grown men you passed them around to. Granted your running mate happens to disagree with you on this particular stance-seeing as he was a loud and proud cigarette truther as recently as 2000-but that’s okay. You two apparently don’t talk a whole lot, and disagree on many things including foreign policy as it relates to Russia, and the topic of grabbing women by the pussy-or at least talking about that kind of thing in public, while mic’d up with Billy Bush.

But I digress.

I know I’m pushing fair use here, but I hope Michael will forgive me-one last snippet

[Did] he have sex with his female party guests? “So, he’s a man with a woman,” Lucchesi [a male model interviewed for the story] says vaguely. How old were they? “A lot of girls, 14, look 24. That’s as juicy as I can get. I never asked how old they were; I just partook. I did partake in activities that would be controversial, too.”

Just, y’know, for the record-it does not matter how old a 14-year-old child looks. In fact, this was me when I was 14:

My nickname was “princess jailbait”. I was a 36 DD by the time I was in 6th grade. My physical development occurred freakishly early, which was devastating because was a tomboy who loved sports and climbing trees. Circus boobs didn’t really allow for those activities.

I was getting into bars by the time I was 16, with a ridiculous fake ID that stated I was 24. Bouncers would sometimes raise an eyebrow, since the picture didn’t remotely resemble me, but they typically let me in with a wink and a nod. After all, I was a hot little thing, with circus boobs, all made up like a tart. I didn’t look like a child so why treat me like one?

But I was, at the end of the day, still very much a child. In fact, I was in many ways more of a child than most of my peers, because my development was arrested around age 10 due to sexual abuse. Which ironically may have actually been the cause of my precocious development in the first place.

And here is the thing-my background is not unusual. I wish it was-but child sexual abuse is insidiously common. It’s also a known and studied factor lurking in the background of girls who end up commodifying their own bodies. From modeling and beauty pageants to porn and prostitution, a history of child sexual abuse is the common denominator

Keep this in mind when you read about men like Donald Trump. Because no matter how much you may be primed to see these girls as older, perhaps even deserving of abuse, they aren’t. Please remember it is men like him that create the conditions that perpetuate their victimization.

Think about the kind of man who sexually objectifies his own daughter, who talks openly about being attracted to a 12-year-old family friend, who sees a 10-year-old little girl and jokes about dating (and thus fucking) her, however many years in the future. Think about the kind of man who muses about the erotic import of emotionally damaged teenage girls in a manner that indicates he knows from experience.

Think about the kind of man who, when asked about his own infant daughter, talks about her legs and speculates on her future breast development. Let’s just pause here, for a moment, because this is just so galling. Babies do not have ”legs” in the way that grown women do. They have rolls of dimpled fat and chubby little feet. There is nothing beautiful or “sexy” about the legs of a baby. And there is nothing remotely normal about comparing the legs of a baby to the legs of a woman you have sex with. That is pathological behavior.

Does it surprise you, then, that a man who says these things has sex trafficked children? And make no mistake-this is exactly what Michael Gross is describing. Have no illusions about this-it is the literal definition of the term.

And please don’t give the presumption of innocence where it is undeserved. No matter what these men say to excuse their behavior, the actual age of the girls they were passing around and fucking was not unknown. Let’s not fool ourselves into thinking that a 14-year-old girl can genuinely be mistaken for a 24-year-old woman-no matter how much makeup is on her face, or how precocious her development may be. Anyone who has raised daughters, interacted with teenagers, or has been around human beings in general knows the goddamn difference. Example:

These are children. Probably around age 14. You are not allowed to have sex with them.

In the aftermath of posting my article about Trump Model Management, I have had a flood of responses from people, including Michael Gross, who have first-hand knowledge of the crimes that Donald Trump, unregistered sex offender, has committed. It is in large part because of this influx of new information that the follow up installments have been delayed. I know people are anxious for the information to come out, and I promise you it will. Soon.

But for the time being, please know one thing: I take no joy from the fact that my initial instincts when I read the Mother Jones article were correct. I also take no solace in confirming that my initial impression of Trump-who I first encountered at age 16 during one of his Howard Stern appearances-was accurate. I knew instinctively that he was an abuser, and everything I’ve learned about him since has reinforced that belief.

The fact that other women, in particular those with a history of abuse, had similar thoughts is affirming, and it is a relief that we can finally say it out loud. The resulting dialogue has been healing in many ways-perhaps the one silver lining to come out of this toxic election, and this toxic candidate.

But make no mistake-this October surprise in progress is not a joyful development. It is horrifying. It is devastating, because there are actual victims involved, and they are actual human beings. It should be a gut check to our nation that a man like Donald Trump could rise to a level of such prominence. This is something that should have never happened. The fact that it did speaks volumes about how we value women and girls in our society.

In light of this I have a request: Please read Michael Gross’s article in The Daily Beast, and pass it along to everyone you know. Don’t let it get lost in the ether. This story is important, because our girls are important.

It’s high time we prove to them that they are.