The Democrats’ Epstein report cites 11 women; five accuse Trump of assault, not 11

Fact-check · Epstein files · Congress

Reviewing: “New Evidence Allegedly Ties Trump to 11 Sexual Assaults Related to Epstein,” Truthout, Oct. 26, 2026, and the House Judiciary Committee Democrats’ staff report it summarizes · Published 2026-10-26 · 8 sources

This article discusses allegations of sexual abuse, including of minors. We describe them only as far as needed to check the claims.

Verdicts

• MisleadingHeadline: new evidence allegedly ties Trump to “11 sexual assaults” related to Epstein.The 11 is a count of women, not assaults. The report says five directly accuse Trump of rape or sexual assault. It counts eight women with first-hand accounts and describes three more only through second-hand reports, one of which describes an alleged assault. The committee’s own summary helps explain the slip, since it calls all 11 “accounts of sexual assault and conspiracy,” and the article’s body does say five.
• MisleadingThe 50-page report “contains testimony from 11 women” who either accuse Trump of assault or say they were offered to him for sex.The report runs 53 pages and was released Monday, Oct. 26. But three of its 11 women “have not come forward,” so there is no testimony from them. They make up a third category the article leaves out: women the report says may have had relationships with both men.
• Mostly True“Five women said that Trump raped or assaulted them while Epstein was present or was in his company.”That is the report’s own count, and the article repeats it accurately. The report itself treats two accounts with more caution: for one woman, interviewed by the FBI in 2019, the committee says elements have been confirmed but it could not independently verify her claim against Trump. The other comes from “Katie Johnson,” whose 2016 lawsuits were dismissed or dropped.
• TrueThe report reveals “for the first time” Trump’s alleged rape of Beatrice Keul, who previously said Trump groped her.The report says Keul had not revealed these details before, and that this section rests “solely” on staff interviews. Time also describes them as new details.
• TruePaolo Zampolli was recently fired from a high-level State Department position.Time, citing Politico, reports that he was fired in mid-October from his post as Special Representative for Global Partnerships.
• MisleadingImplied: the report’s allegations are established; it “establishes several patterns” and documents “other assaults committed by Trump.”Those are the article’s words. The report is a staff document from the committee’s minority party, released eight days before an election. It collects allegations, most already public, and argues they justify an investigation. No court or prosecutor has made findings on them, and the White House denies all of them.
• FalseStacey Williams “briefly dated Trump.”The report says Williams dated Epstein in the early 1990s, after meeting him at a Christmas party Trump hosted. It does not say she dated Trump.

The article

The article summarizes a report by Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee and quotes the committee’s top Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland.^[1] Raskin’s words match the committee’s Oct. 26 press release, though the article splits the quote in two and drops a clause between them without marking the cut.^[3] Most of the article’s detail on Keul, on the pageant and on the “playbook” comparison comes straight from the report.^[2] The problems are in the counting and in what the article leaves out.

What “11” counts

The report sorts its 11 women into three groups.^[2]

At the end of its witness section, the report says “eight separate women have shared significant detail about sexual misconduct,” and describes the other three through “significant second-hand reports.”^[2] The press release frames it the same way: five women “have directly accused Trump,” and “others have indicated” attempts to traffic them to him.^[3] Neither describes 11 sexual assaults. The headline adds “allegedly,” but the number it attaches to that word is still wrong.

The body of the article is closer, but it says the report “contains testimony from 11 women.” Three of the women have given no testimony, and the report says “there is no definitive account of their relationship with either Epstein or Trump.”^[2] The article’s two categories, accusers and women offered to Trump, leave out that third group. The page count is a minor slip. The PDF runs 53 pages, which matches other coverage.^[2]

The five direct accusations

The report’s five direct accusers vary in how firmly the account is sourced, and the report itself flags some of that.^[2]

• Beatrice Keul spoke with committee staff over several weeks. Her account is discussed below.
• Stacey Williams, a former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, dated Epstein in the early 1990s, according to the report. She has said publicly that Trump groped her in his Trump Tower office in 1993 while Epstein looked on. The report cites CNN interviews with three women who say she told them about it in 2006, 2015 and 2018.^[2] Truthout describes her as someone “who briefly dated Trump,” which the report does not say.^[1]
• Jill Harth sued Trump in 1997, alleging he forcibly kissed and fondled her at Mar-a-Lago in 1993. The report says she settled that suit “as a condition of” Trump settling, with a payment, a separate suit brought by her spouse.^[2]
• “Katie Johnson” is a pseudonym. Lawsuits under that name in 2016 accused Trump and Epstein of raping her when she was 13. Politico reported that the first suit was dismissed for failing to state valid claims under federal law, a second was withdrawn, and a refiled version was dropped in November 2016. It also reported that news accounts “raised doubts about who filed the suit.”^[8] The report relies on an FBI complaint form describing the same allegations, which it says came through her attorney.^[2]
• A Jane Doe was interviewed by the FBI in 2019 after a third party reported that Trump had abused her when she was 13 or 14. The committee’s press release says she “told the FBI” that Trump struck her.^[3] The report says that “while elements of her story have been confirmed,” the committee “has not been able to independently verify” her claims against Trump, and that her account would predate other survivor reports by nearly a decade.^[2] The report is also inconsistent about where this happened. Its summary says New York, while the FBI tip form it reproduces says New Jersey. The body separately describes Epstein abusing her in South Carolina in 1983.

So “five women said” is the report’s count, and Truthout repeats it accurately. The report itself handles two of the five with more caution than the article does: it says it could not verify one, and the other rests on pseudonymous lawsuits that ended without a ruling on the merits. The article includes “Katie Johnson” without that history.^[1]

What is new

Compared against: Keul’s earlier public accounts (the Daily Mail and others in October 2024), and the previously published accounts of the other four direct accusers.

The article says the report “reveals, for the first time,” Trump’s alleged rape of Keul. That matches the report, which says Keul “has not revealed the additional details of her assault contained within this report until now” and that the section “relies solely on extensive discussions between Committee Staff and Keul over a period of several weeks.”^[2] Time likewise describes them as new details and says it could not independently verify them.^[4]

The “first time” applies only to Keul. Time reports that the other four direct allegations “had all been previously made public either through media interviews or FBI testimony released as part of the Epstein files.”^[4] What the report adds is the compilation, its argument that the accounts follow a pattern, and its claim that the Justice Department has withheld related records.^[2]

Zampolli

The article describes Paolo Zampolli, the modeling agent the report says Trump named to Keul as the person who would arrange her visa, as “recently fired” from the State Department.^[1] Time reports that he was Special Representative for Global Partnerships until he was fired in mid-October, citing Politico. Time also notes that the report accuses Zampolli of taking part in Epstein’s operation. That accusation is separate and unproven.^[4]

The responses

The White House told Spectrum News, “None of these allegations are true.” Spokeswoman Lauren Bis called the report “a desperate attempt by crazed Democrats to distract Americans” and said Trump “has been fully exonerated of anything related to Epstein.”^[5] Communications director Steven Cheung called it “lies and ridiculous accusations” timed for the election.^[6] The Justice Department did not respond to Spectrum’s request for comment.^[5] The Truthout article includes none of these responses.^[1]

The report calls for an independent special counsel and says the evidence meets the FBI’s standard for opening an investigation, that a federal crime “may have occurred.”^[2] That is a low threshold for starting an inquiry. It is not a finding that a crime took place.

What the article implies

That the report establishes the allegations

The article says the evidence “paints a picture of Trump as a serial sexual assault perpetrator who collaborated closely with Epstein to find and traffic victims,” that “the report establishes several patterns,” and that Democrats “collate other assaults committed by Trump.”^[1] Those are the report’s arguments, and the article states them in its own voice. The report was written by the committee’s minority staff and released eight days before the Nov. 3 election.^[2][4] It is not a committee finding, a court record or a prosecutor’s conclusion. Its evidence is the women’s accounts, FBI records released under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, and staff interviews. It acknowledges that it could not verify at least one account. Maxwell is the only person convicted of sex trafficking of minors in the Epstein case.^[4] Calling the material “new evidence” also overstates how much of it is new.

Keul’s earlier account

The article says Keul “has previously said that Trump groped her.”^[1] That is accurate. It does not say what else her earlier account included. In October 2024, as relayed by The New Republic from her Daily Mail interview, she said Trump “jumped” on her in a Plaza Hotel suite, kissed her and tried to lift her dress, and that her height helped her fend him off before they talked for half an hour.^[7] The report’s footnote says she previously stated “she had talked ‘Trump down’ when he attempted to rape her.”^[2] The account in the report is of rape. Describing her fear at the time, Keul told the Daily Mail, “when you’re scared, you say whatever it takes to save yourself.”^[7] A changed account does not show that either version is false, and we do not rate her account. Readers weighing it should know both versions, and the article gives only part of the earlier one.

The strongest case for each side

For the article

The report exists, it does name 11 women, and the article accurately conveys its strongest new allegation, its pattern argument and Raskin’s charges against the Justice Department. The headline says “allegedly.” Several of the accounts have corroboration the report documents: three women Williams told years before going public, Harth’s 1997 lawsuit, and the fact that prosecutors called “Jane” and “Kate” as witnesses at Maxwell’s trial.^[2]

Against it

A headline about 11 sexual assaults describes something the report does not claim. The article leaves out the White House denial, the report’s own concession that one account is unverified, the history of the “Katie Johnson” lawsuits, the fuller version of Keul’s earlier account, and the report’s partisan origin. It also gets Williams’s relationship wrong. Each omission makes the allegations look firmer than the report itself says they are.

What survives both: the report collects serious allegations, five of them direct, and the article reports its contents mostly accurately. Its headline count and its omissions overstate what has been shown.

What it means

The report’s value is in collecting documents and accounts in one place and in its demand for records the Justice Department has not released. It is a political document making a case for an investigation. A headline that turns “11 women” into “11 sexual assaults” gives critics a factual error to point at, which makes the documented parts easier to dismiss.

Much of the report’s argument depends on the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law that requires the Justice Department to release its Epstein records. The report says the department has withheld documents the law covers, including FBI agents’ handwritten notes, and Time and Spectrum report the same accusation.^[2][4] The Justice Department did not respond to Spectrum.^[5]

The open questions are whether any investigator acts on the report, and whether withheld FBI records, such as the handwritten notes the report says exist for the Jane Doe interview, ever become public.^[2] If Democrats win a House majority on Nov. 3, Raskin would likely chair the committee and could pursue those records with subpoena power. That is a forecast, not a certainty.

What to watch

• The Nov. 3 election, which decides whether Democrats gain subpoena power over the committee.
• Any Justice Department response to the call for a special counsel.
• Release of the FBI records the report says are being withheld.
• Whether Keul, or any other woman in the report, repeats her account under oath or in a legal filing.
• Whether Truthout corrects its headline or the description of Stacey Williams.