The Washington Post - 06.09.2019

A4 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 6 , 2019

BY BETH REINHARD

A staffer on Donald Trump’s
2016 presidential campaign is
dropping a lawsuit that accused
him of kissing her without her
consent at a small gathering of
supporters before a Florida rally.
A federal judge dismissed Alva
Johnson’s lawsuit in June, calling
it a “political statement,” but said
she could file a revised complaint
accusing Trump of simple bat-
tery. Johnson said in a statement

Thursday that she will not pursue the case, saying the president has “unlimited resources and a judicial system that has so far refused to hold him accountable.” In the lawsuit, Johnson accused Trump of grabbing her hand and leaning in to kiss her on the lips as he exited an RV outside a campaign rally in Tampa on Aug. 24,

Johnson said she turned her
head and the kiss landed on the
side of her mouth. She described
feeling anguish and humiliation

that led her to quit the campaign before the election. U.S. District Judge William F. Jung rejected Johnson’s argument that accusations of sexual miscon- duct from other women against Trump were relevant to her case. “Though this simple battery appears to have lasted perhaps 10-15 seconds, Plaintiff has spent 29 pages and 115 paragraphs in the Complaint setting it forth,” wrote Jung, who was appointed by Trump in 2017. “Many of these

allegations describe 19 unrelated incidents involving women upon whom Donald Trump allegedly committed nonconsensual acts, over the past four decades with differing circumstances.” Charles Harder, an attorney for Trump, called Johnson’s deci- sion to give up the case “a total victory for President Trump” and said it “fully vindicates him of Johnson’s false accusations.” In July, Harder submitted video of the kiss, taken by a campaign

worker, that the attorney said showed “an innocent interaction that is mutual.” Hassan Zavareei, a lawyer for Johnson, said the video “corroborates exactly what Alva said.” When the suit was filed in February, in federal court in Flor- ida, then-White House press sec- retary Sarah Sanders said of Johnson’s allegation: “This never happened and is directly contra- dicted by multiple highly cred- ible eye witness accounts.” Two Trump supporters Johnson identified as witnesses — a campaign official and Pam Bondi, then the Florida attorney general — de-

nied seeing the kiss in interviews with The Washington Post. Harder said the president and the Trump campaign are de- manding that Johnson pay legal fees and are considering a suit against her for breaching a non- disclosure agreement she signed when she joined the campaign. Trump still faces a defamation lawsuit from former “Apprentice” contestant Summer Zervos, who says Trump forcibly kissed and groped her during a December 2007 encounter at the Beverly Hills Hotel in Los Angeles. Trump has denied the allegations. [email protected]

Former Trump campaign staffer drops lawsuit

Wednesday that its lab tests found
nothing unusual in nicotine prod-
ucts that had been collected from
sick patients, according to an-
other person who took part in the
call.
The investigation has been par-
ticularly challenging for health
authorities. Officials are trying to
come up with a consistent defini-
tion of the illness and a standard-
ized system for collecting infor-
mation from states. Unlike certain
infectious diseases, such as mea-
sles, which must be reported to
federal authorities, states are not
required to report possible cases
of vaping-related illnesses to the
Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, which is leading the
investigation.
State health departments are
reporting new cases weekly. As of
Aug. 27, there were 215 possible
cases reported by 25 states. Addi-
tional reports of lung illnesses are
under investigation, according to
the CDC, which is leading the
investigation.
On Wednesday, Oregon health
authorities said a middle-aged
adult who died in late July of a
severe respiratory illness had
used an e-cigarette containing
marijuana oil purchased from a
legal dispensary. It’s the second
death linked to vaping nationwide
and the first to be linked to a
product bought at a store. Illinois
officials reported the first death
last week. They did not specify
what kind of product was used in
that case.
State and federal health author-
ities have said they are focusing on
the role of contaminants or coun-
terfeit substances as a likely cause
of vaping-related lung illnesses.

VAPING FROM A

Many patients have told officials and clinicians that they bought cannabis products off the street. Many of those who have fallen ill say they have vaped products containing marijuana, but others said they used nicotine e-cigarettes. Many report using both. Authori- ties said they are not ruling out adulterants in nicotine vaping products. Although the discovery of a common chemical in lab tests from the FDA and New York’s highly regarded Wadsworth Cen- ter lab offers a potential lead, officials cautioned that they are a long

way from understanding what exactly is making so many people sick. An FDA spokesman said the agency is “looking into potential leads regarding any particular constituent or compound that may be at issue.” The FDA is analyzing samples for a broad range of chemicals, including nicotine, THC, other cannabinoids, “cutting agents” that may be used to dilute liquids, other additives, pesticides, opi- oids, poisons and toxins. THC is the component in marijuana that makes users high.

“The number of samples received continues to increase and we now have over 100 samples for testing,” FDA spokesman Michael Felberbaum said Thursday. “No one substance, including Vitamin E acetate, has been identified in all of the samples tested. Important- ly, identifying any compounds that are present in the samples will be one piece of the puzzle but will not necessarily answer questions about causality.” Vitamin E acetate was found in 10 of the 18 THC products suitable for testing. “This was the only thing that

seemed to show up in 10 of the 18 cannabis products,” said one state official who took part in the call. Late last week, New York’s state lab found “very high levels of vitamin E acetate in nearly all” its cannabis samples tested. More than a dozen samples were tested, a health department spokeswom- an said Thursday. At least one vaping product containing vitamin E acetate has been linked to each patient who submitted a product for testing, the department said. “Vitamin E acetate is not an approved additive for New York State Medical Marijuana Progra- m-authorized vape samples and was not seen in the nicotine-based products that were tested. As a result, vitamin E acetate is now a key focus” of New York’s investigation, New York State Health Com- missioner Howard Zucker said in a statement Thursday. As of Thursday, New York had received 34 reports from doctors of severe pulmonary illness among patients who ranged in age from 15 to 46 who were using at least one cannabis-containing vape product before becoming sick. All patients reported recent use of various vape products, officials said. The second report of a death has emphasized the danger of this lung disease. “It was surprising that the patient suddenly ap- peared without any other underly- ing health conditions and became ill enough to die from this syn- drome,” said Ann Thomas, a physi- cian with the Oregon Health Au- thority. Vaping frequently involves heating a liquid that can contain nicotine, marijuana or other drugs and inhaling the vapor.

Vitamin E acetate is basically grease, said Michelle Francl, a chemistry professor at Bryn Mawr College. Its molecular structure means that “you have to heat it up pretty hot” for it to vaporize. Its boiling point is 363 degrees Fahr- enheit. Once the oil is heated enough to vaporize, it can potentially decom- pose, and “now you’re breathing in who-knows-what,” Francl said. When that vapor cools down in the lungs, it returns to its original state at that temperature and pressure, she said, which means “it has now coated the inside of your lungs with that oil,” she said. In Utah, clinicians have treated several patients with acute lung injuries who were diagnosed with a rare condition known as lipoid pneumonia, with symptoms including chest pain and difficulty breathing. Those patients had ab- normal immune cells filled with lipids, doctors said. Laura Crotty Alexander, a lung inflammation and e-cigarette re- searcher at the University of Cali- fornia at San Diego’s School of Medicine, said it’s not clear whether the chemical itself or its byproducts could be toxic. “We haven’t looked at the toxici- ty of vitamin E in the lungs,” she said. “The lungs are designed to exchange gas molecules; they’re not designed to be exposed to other chemicals.” The lungs are very delicate. When lung cells die and immune cells enter to clean up the debris, they can interfere with oxygen entering a person’s bloodstream. The inflammation can cause liquid to accumulate in the lungs, she said. making it difficult for some- one to breathe. [email protected]

It’s too soon to tell whether chemical is causing vaping illnesses, officials say

NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH These vaping products contain vitamin E acetate, an oil commonly used as a nutritional supplement and in topical skin treatments whose molecular structure could make it hazardous when inhaled.

BY TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA AND JOSH DAWSEY

He posted nine tweets and five
maps about Alabama and the big
storm.
He defended a doctored hurri-
cane map that had been altered
with a black Sharpie to include
the state.
And he had his White House
release a 225-word statement de-
fending his erroneous warnings
that Alabama was “going to get a
piece” of the storm.
As Hurricane Dorian battered
the Carolinas with torrential rain
and wind Thursday, President
Trump remained fixated on sunny
Alabama — a state he falsely
claimed was in the storm’s
crosshairs long after it was in the
clear.
For a fourth straight day,
Trump’s White House sought to
clean up the president’s mistaken
warnings to Alabama from Sun-
day, seeking to defend Trump’s
tweets by releasing statements,
disseminating alternative hurri-
cane maps and attacking the me-
dia.
Trump also took to Twitter
again to defend his use of a doc-
tored and outdated hurricane
map that looped in Alabama us-
ing black marker — the latest
iteration in a days-long, adminis-
tration-wide campaign on the
topic.
In effect, Trump was attempt-
ing to bend time — claiming that a
projection that was several days
out of date was accurate at the
time he warned Alabama of a dire
threat that didn’t exist.
“Just as I said, Alabama was
originally projected to be hit,”
Trump tweeted Thursday, high-
lighting week-old maps that
showed a low probability of tropi-
cal-storm winds in a small corner
of Alabama. “The Fake News de-
nies it!”
Trump’s fixation on his erro-
neous Dorian warnings under-
scores a long history of defending
inaccurate claims — from the
crowd size at his inaugural ad-
dress to false claims of voter fraud
in 2016 to fictional “unknown
Middle Easterners” streaming
across the southern border in mi-
grant caravans.
Tim O’Brien, a Trump biogra-
pher and executive editor of
Bloomberg Opinion, said the Ala-

bama claims underscore the president’s belief that admitting error is a sign of weakness. “He’s doubling down on the worst sides of his troubled per- sonality — to never admit an error and to continue obsessing about it, and emphasizing it, when it doesn’t serve him well to do so,” he said. “He doesn’t move along be- cause he is incapable of moving along.” Trump, who canceled a trip to Poland to monitor the storm, was especially sensitive to the criti- cism he has received for misrepre- senting the hurricane’s path, according to current and former officials. “Always good to be prepared! But the Fake News is only inter- ested in demeaning and belit- tling,” Trump tweeted Monday, complaining about an ABC News report that highlighted the dis- crepancy between Trump’s warnings to Alabama and the govern- ment’s assurance that the state was not under threat. “What I said was accurate! All Fake News in order to demean!” Trump tweeted Thursday, adding: “I accept the Fake News apolo- gies!” Trump, who has privately and publicly griped about media coverage during the Group of 7 sum- mit last month, complained ex- tensively to administration officials this week about coverage of the Alabama issue and asked aides to bring him old briefings showing Alabama in the storm’s potential path. Even as the Cat- egory 2 hurricane knocked out power and damaged property in the Carolinas on Thursday, Trump was highlighting old maps in an attempt to prove that his original claims about Alabama were accurate. The White House also released a lengthy statement from Trump’s homeland security and counter- terrorism adviser, Rear Adm. Pe- ter Brown, that sought to defend Trump’s statements and his use of days-old maps. “While speaking to the press on Sunday, September 1, the Presi- dent addressed Hurricane Dorian and its potential impact on multiple states, including Alabama,” Brown wrote. “The President’s comments were based on that morning’s Hurricane Dorian briefing, which included the pos-

sibility of tropical storm force winds in southeastern Alabama.” It was Trump who used a black Sharpie to mark up an official National Oceanic and Atmos- pheric Administration map, which he displayed during an Oval Office briefing on Wednes- day, according to a White House official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss inter- nal deliberations. “No one else writes like that on a map with a black Sharpie,” the official said of the map, which added Alabama into the hurricane’s potential pathway inside the loop of the marker. Several White House officials argued that media coverage of the Alabama issue has been unfair to Trump, but one senior administration official said that “as long as it’s in the news, he is not going to drop it.” Trump has recently fixated on minor points of grievance that

aides and Republican lawmakers would prefer he avoid, such as former aide Anthony Scaramucci, actress Debra Messing and an Axios story that said he proposed bombing hurricanes to stop their progress. On Sunday, after a weekend spent at Camp David with after- noons at his Virginia golf course, Trump warned multiple times that Alabama was likely to be hit. But the storm had already turned northward at that point, and models from the National Hurri- cane Center did not show Ala- bama at any significant risk. Twenty minutes after Trump tweeted Sunday that Alabama was among states that would “most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated,” the National Weather Service in Birmingham, Ala., tweeted bluntly that was not the case. “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from #Dorian. We repeat, no

impacts from Hurricane #Dorian will be felt across Alabama,” it said. “The system will remain too far east.” Just a few minutes later, the president spoke to reporters and again claimed that Alabama was “going to get a piece of it.” Brown, who joined the White House National Security Council from the Coast Guard, had been assigned to give weekend updates to Trump on the storm. “We spent two days at Camp David going over a lot of different things having to do with the hurricane,” Trump said of Brown. “The admiral has informed me through all of the different sources that he has — but you can pretty much get it on television, admiral — this is now a Category 5.” An NSC spokesman did not respond to questions about whether Brown had briefed the president about updated forecasts over the weekend that

showed Alabama in the clear. Brown said in his statement Thursday that he had briefed Trump on the hurricane Sunday morning using forecasts from the National Hurricane Center that showed a remote possibility of tropical-storm winds in a south- east corner of Alabama. He said he also briefed Trump using other meteorological models. “These products showed possible storm impacts well outside the official forecast cone,” he wrote. During a briefing at FEMA headquarters on Sunday after- noon, Trump acknowledged gov- ernors who had dialed in from Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. He then turned to a state that wasn’t rep- resented on the line. “It may get a little piece of a great place: It’s called Alabama,” Trump said. “And Alabama could even be in for at least some very strong winds and something more than that, it could be. This just came up, unfortunately. It’s the size of the storm that we’re talking about. So, for Alabama, just please be careful also.” Maps tweeted out by Trump on Thursday showed part of southeastern Alabama with a 5 to 20 percent chance of tropical-storm- force winds — a week-old forecast that was long out of date by the time the president tweeted out his warnings to the state Sunday. Trump claimed Wednesday that Alabama had faced a 95 percent chance of a direct hit, a claim not borne out by meteorological models. Some Democrats criticized Trump for focusing on the wrong thing during a natural disaster. South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who is running for the Democratic nomination for president, said on CNN Thursday that he felt “sorry for the president.” “I don’t know if he felt it neces- sary to pull out a Sharpie and change the map, I don’t know if one of his aides felt they had to do that to protect his ego,” he said. “No matter how you cut it, this is an unbelievably sad state of af- fairs for our country.” [email protected] [email protected]

Andrew Freedman and Jason Samenow contributed to this report.

Trump stays fixated on his Alabama error as Dorian pounds the Carolinas

@REALDONALDTRUMP/TWITTER President Trump continued to post tweets and maps about Alabama on Thursday.

The Washington Post - 06.09.2019

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