About 1 in 3 of Trump’s cabinet picks have been accused of sexual misconduct

Trump himself has long been accused of abusing or mistreating women and once was caught bragging about grabbing women by the genitals. He was found liable by a New York City jury for sexual abuse and defamation and eventually ordered to pay the woman, E. Jean Carroll, $83 million in damages.

Taken together, there are a striking number of incidents in which potential high-ranking government officials in Trump’s second administration face allegations of sexual abuse. Trump and all of his picks for government have denied the claims against them, with some of the people accused arguing the cases are driven by politics.

With six members of the 15-plus member leadership team facing allegations, approximately one-third of the top White House staff have a history of misconduct claims.

Here’s a look at what’s known about the cases:

President-elect Donald Trump

Jurors in New York last year found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll, an advice columnist, in 1996.

The verdict was split: Jurors rejected Carroll’s claim that she was raped, finding Trump responsible for a lesser degree of sexual abuse. Jurors also found Trump liable for defaming Carroll over her allegations. Trump did not attend the civil trial and was absent when the verdict was read.

Carroll was one of more than a dozen women who have accused Trump of sexual assault or harassment. She went public in a 2019 memoir with her allegation that the Republican raped her in the dressing room of a posh Manhattan department store.

Trump denied it, saying he never encountered Carroll at the store and did not know her. He has called her a “nut job” who invented “a fraudulent and false story” to sell a memoir. He has similarly denied claims by other women.

Pete Hegseth, nominee for secretary of defense

A woman told police that she was sexually assaulted in 2017 by Hegseth after he took her phone, blocked the door to a California hotel room and refused to let her leave, according to a detailed investigative report made public this week.

Hegseth told police at the time that the encounter had been consensual and denied any wrongdoing, the report said.

News of the allegations surfaced last week when local officials released a brief statement confirming that a woman had accused Hegseth of sexual assault in October 2017 after he had spoken at a Republican women’s event in Monterey.

Hegseth’s lawyer, Timothy Parlatore, said in a…