--- title: White House Denies Claim That Trump Forced Kiss on Staffer description: The White House has denied a former campaign staffer's claim that Donald Trump kissed her without her consent during his 2016 run. canonical: https://time.com/5537033/donald-trump-alva-johnson/ author: Abby Vesoulis article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-02-25T16:27:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:45:05.892Z article:section: Politics og:title: White House Denies Claim That Trump Forced Kiss on Staffer og:description: 'This never happened,' White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders wrote og:url: https://time.com/5537033/donald-trump-alva-johnson/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6cbaac78b18a843f/698944bd97cdff749b6b74c1/donald-trump-isis-speech.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: President Trump Delivers Remarks To Ministers Of Global Coalition To Defeat ISIS og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: White House Denies Claim That Trump Forced Kiss on Staffer twitter:description: 'This never happened,' White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders wrote twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6cbaac78b18a843f/698944bd97cdff749b6b74c1/donald-trump-isis-speech.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # White House Denies Former Campaign Staffer's Claim That Donald Trump Kissed Her Without Consent > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Abby Vesoulis](https://time.com/author/abby-vesoulis/)  ## Abby Vesoulis Feb 25, 2019 4:27 PM UTC  President Donald Trump delivers remarks to Ministers of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS at the State Department Feb. 6, 2019 in Washington, DC. President Donald Trump delivers remarks to Ministers of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS at the State Department Feb. 6, 2019 in Washington, DC. Alex Wong—Getty Images  by [Abby Vesoulis](https://time.com/author/abby-vesoulis/)  ## Abby Vesoulis Feb 25, 2019 4:27 PM UTC The White House has denied a former campaign staffer’s claim that Donald Trump kissed her without her consent during his 2016 run. White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders called the allegation “absurd on its face” in a [statement](https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/former-campaign-staffer-alleges-in-lawsuit-that-trump-kissed-her-without-her-consent-the-white-house-denies-the-charge/2019/02/25/fe1869a4-3498-11e9-946a-115a5932c45b%5Fstory.html?utm%5Fterm=.f83582f32bcc). “This never happened and is directly contradicted by multiple highly credible eye witness accounts,” she wrote. In a [lawsuit](https://games-cdn.washingtonpost.com/notes/prod/default/documents/22944b19-62ff-428c-8913-4a329c207243/note/e4114bea-db1f-4c05-9fe4-dba1e97df7ec.pdf) filed Monday, former Trump campaign staffer Alva Johnson said Trump grabbed her hand and forced a kiss with her while hosting a rally in Tampa, Florida on Aug. 24, 2016. “Defendant Trump grasped her hand and did not let go. He told her he knew she had been on the road for a long time and that she had been doing a great job,” the lawsuit alleges. “Ms. Johnson suddenly realized that Defendant Trump was trying to kiss her on the mouth, and attempted to avoid this by turning her head to the right. Defendant Trump kissed her anyway, and the kiss landed on the corner of her mouth.” Johnson is not the first woman to claim Trump acted inappropriately toward her. [More than a dozen](http://time.com/5058646/donald-trump-accusers/) came forward with allegations against Trump during his 2016 campaign, but he maintained they were all lying and that he intended to sue them after the election was over. “Every woman lied when they came forward to hurt my campaign,” [Trump said](https://www.cnn.com/2016/10/22/politics/trump-says-hell-sue-sexual-misconduct-accusers/index.html) while speaking in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. “Total fabrication. The events never happened. Never. All of these liars will be sued after the election is over.” He has not yet sued them. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5537033/donald-trump-alva-johnson/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5537033/donald-trump-alva-johnson/"},"headline":"White House Denies Former Campaign Staffer's Claim That Donald Trump Kissed Her Without Consent","datePublished":"2019-02-25T16:27:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:45:05.892Z","description":"The White House has denied a former campaign staffer's claim that Donald Trump kissed her without her consent during his 2016 run.","url":"https://time.com/5537033/donald-trump-alva-johnson/","keywords":["Donald Trump","2016 Election"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6cbaac78b18a843f/698944bd97cdff749b6b74c1/donald-trump-isis-speech.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Abby Vesoulis","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/abby-vesoulis/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6cbaac78b18a843f/698944bd97cdff749b6b74c1/donald-trump-isis-speech.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President Trump Delivers Remarks To Ministers Of Global Coalition To Defeat ISIS","caption":"President Trump Delivers Remarks To Ministers Of Global Coalition To Defeat ISIS","creditText":"Alex Wong—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5537033/donald-trump-alva-johnson/","name":"White House Denies Former Campaign Staffer's Claim That Donald Trump Kissed Her Without Consent"}}]}] ```