At least four former beauty pageant contestants have come forward with accusations that Donald Trump walked in on them as they were naked, a claim apparently backed up by 2005 audio of the Republican presidential nominee.
"Our first introduction to him was when we were at the dress rehearsal and half naked, changing into our bikinis," former Miss Arizona Tasha Dixon told KCBS. She was 18 years old in 2001, when she competed for the title of Miss USA.
"He just came strolling right in," she said. "There was no second to put a robe on or any sort of clothing or anything. Some girls were topless. Other girls were naked."
Dixon said she decided to come forward after audio recorded on a hot microphone in April 2005 surfaced last week, showing Trump speaking in a vulgar way about women.
Trump owned the Miss USA pageant from 1996 to 2015.
"I'm telling you, Donald Trump owned the pageant for the reasons to utilize his power to get around beautiful women," Dixon told KCBS. "Who do you complain to? He owns the pageant. There's no one to complain to. Everyone there works for him."
At least three other women echoed Dixon's claims in interviews with BuzzFeed News.
Bridget Sullivan, Miss New Hampshire 2000, told the news website in May that Trump made her uncomfortable, because "he'd hug you just a little low on your back" and "(give) a squeeze like your creepy uncle would."
"The time that he walked through the dressing room was really shocking," Sullivan said. "We were all naked."
In response to the report, Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks called the allegations "totally false."
Eleven other contestants told BuzzFeed News that they did not see Trump in the dressing room.
However, in an interview with Howard Stern in April 2005, Trump bragged about getting to go backstage at the pageant while women were getting dressed "because I'm the owner … and therefore, I'm inspecting it."
The interview, part of an episode of "The Howard Stern Show," was unearthed by CNN last week.
"You know, they're standing there with no clothes. 'Is everybody okay?' And you see these incredible looking women, and so, I sort of get away with things like that," Trump said.
The allegations broke as multiple women came forward and claimed Trump sexually assaulted them in interviews with The New York Times, NBC News and other outlets.
Trump's campaign has denied the reports and, in a statement Wednesday, characterized The New York Times report as a "coordinated character assassination."
Cox Media Group
