Former presidential campaign staffer Alva Johnson, who is suing Donald Trump for giving her a ‘super creepy’ kiss, now claims the President’s lawyers used a ‘spliced-together’ video of the event to try to get the case thrown out, DailyMail.com can exclusively reveal.
The 15 second cell phone clip appears to show the then-presidential candidate giving Johnson nothing more than an innocent peck on the cheek at a 2016 campaign rally in Tampa, Florida.
But Johnson, 44, of Birmingham, Alabama, fired back this week, arguing the video filed in Federal Court and made public by Trump’s lawyers to trash her case is not the original footage – and could even have been altered or cropped.
The mother-of-four also says the clip is lacking any of the information, known as metadata, that is typically embedded in photos and video to provide info such as author, date, and file size.
‘Because she could get no information from defendants – other than their repeated assertion that the 15 second segment was the original unaltered video – Ms. Johnson retained a forensic expert to examine the video,’ her attorneys allege in papers filed on July 26.
‘That forensic examination has raised some serious questions regarding the provenance, authenticity, and completeness of that video.’
Mother-of-four Alva Johnson, 44, of Birmingham, Alabama, filed a lawsuit alleging Donald Trump ‘forcibly’ kissed her during a campaign stop in Tampa, Florida
Alva Johnson (right) claims Trump’s kiss was ‘gross,’ ‘creepy’ and ‘inappropriate.’ She also says she was forced to turn her head and the then-candidate’s kiss landed on the corner of her mouth. But the 15 second phone video provided by Trump’s lawyers did not appear to corroborate this
Lawyers for Alva Johnson (pictured) hired a forensic expert to go through the video footage provided by Trump’s legal team. Her attorneys allege, ‘That forensic examination has raised some serious questions regarding the provenance, authenticity, and completeness of that video’
Johnson is asking the US District Court in Tampa to reopen the discovery process so she can compel Trump’s team to hand over ‘the original video and test its authenticity.’
She alleges in her suit, which began in February, that Trump grabbed her hand and leaned in to forcibly kiss her on the lips as he left an RV outside a campaign rally in August 2016.
‘I immediately felt violated because I wasn’t expecting it or wanting it,’ she later told The Washington Post. ‘I can still see his lips coming straight for my face.’
Johnson said she turned her head and the ‘super-creepy and inappropriate’ kiss landed on the side of her mouth.
But last month Trump’s lawyers publicly released the 15 second clip captured on cellphone by campaign volunteer Brian Hayes which they contend undermines her claims.
Even more troubling for Johnson, when the video was filed with the court she was admonished by a judge and urged to ‘carefully review’ its contents before proceeding with her claims of battery and sexually predatory behavior.
Johnson’s attorneys now say, however, it was part of more than eight hours of ‘spliced-together video of media coverage’ from various sources including ABC Arizona, Fox 10 Phoenix, Channel 90, APC 7 Suncoast News, several YouTube channels, and others.
Johnson said she was lauding Trump – claiming she left her family for eight months to work on the campaign – when he came over to her and grabbed her hand, held on to it forcibly before he kissed her
Johnson is asking the court to reopen the discovery process so she can compel Trump’s team to hand over ‘the original video and test its authenticity’
‘Buried deep in the compilation, at 07:39:44 (i.e. over seven hours into the compilation) is a brief video, taken on a cell phone, showing President Trump kissing Ms. Johnson,’ the filing reads.
‘As such, that initially-produced eight-hour spliced-together video has no metadata that would identify the source of the 15 second segment or would show whether and when the segment was altered.’
Johnson’s filing says Trump’s lawyers refused requests to supply the ‘original unaltered video’ without edits and containing the full metadata.
This is despite her hiring an expert who confirmed that it appeared to be a snippet from a longer clip and that some of the original cell phone footage may have been cropped out.
‘While Ms. Johnson is mindful of the Court’s admonitions, she also believes she is entitled to a full and fair record surrounding the video recording that caused the Court to believe it may be in her best interests to not pursue the battery claim,’ her filing says.
‘Her requests are modest, but important. For the reasons set forth herein, she respectfully asks the Court to reopen discovery to allow her to conduct discovery necessary to determine when the video was altered, to try to authenticate the video, and to access the original unaltered video.’
At least 17 women have accused Trump of inappropriate behavior including allegations of sexual harassment or assault.
Controversy surrounding this topic started in 2016 when his campaign was almost derailed with the release of the now-infamous Access Hollywood tape.
The audio recording from 2005 included him bragging about grabbing women by the ‘p***y’ and claiming he could get away with sexual assault as a famous person.
The president has also faced an immense amount of scrutiny for his extramarital relationships with former Playboy model Karen McDougal and adult entertainer Stormy Daniels – especially in regards to hush money payments made for their silence regarding their relationships.
Former Vice President Joe Biden’s physical interactions with women has also come under fire during his 2020 campaign.
He has faced scrutiny especially from a group of at least seven women who said Biden touched them in ways that made them feel uncomfortable, such as putting his hands on their shoulders or kissing the top of their heads.
They did not go as far as to accuse the former vice president of sexual misconduct.