Police report reveals new details from sexual assault allegation against Trump's defense secretary nominee

(CNN) A California woman told police that Trump Cabinet pick Pete Hegseth physically blocked her from leaving a hotel room, took her phone, and then sexually assaulted her even though she “remembered saying ‘no’ a lot,” a police report obtained by CNN shows.

The 22-page report, released by the city attorney’s office of Monterey, California, on Wednesday night in response to a public records request, lays out the competing narratives of what happened in new detail – including conflicting accounts of how intoxicated Hegseth and the woman were, and descriptions of video surveillance showing some of their movements that night.

Hegseth, who President-elect Donald Trump has named as his pick for secretary of defense, told police that their encounter was consensual, and that he had repeatedly made sure the woman “was comfortable with what was going on between the two of them.”

Seven years after the alleged assault, questions over what happened that night could jeopardize Hegseth’s nomination and seem likely to be central in his upcoming confirmation hearing.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/21/politics/pete-hegseth-police-report-defense-secretary-trump/index.html