Corey Lewandowski, the campaign manager for Donald Trump, has been charged with misdemeanor battery for allegedly grabbing a female reporter at a scrum. Former Breitbart News reporter Michelle Fields claimed Mr. Lewandowski left bruises on her arm following a press conference at Trump’s Mar-A-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida.
The Trump campaign and the candidate himself have maintained Mr. Lewandowski did nothing wrong and Ms. Fields was either mistaken or made up the confrontation. Fields, who claims not to have seen who roughly grabbed her arm, was standing next to numerous other reporters. A Washington Post reporter, who is undoubtedly adversarial to Trump and his candidacy, identified Mr. Lewandowski as the man.
“Mr. Lewandowski was issued a Notice to Appear and given a court date. He was not arrested. Mr. Lewandowski is absolutely innocent of this charge. He will enter a plea of not guilty and looks forward to his day in court. He is completely confident that he will be exonerated,” Trump’s campaign said in a statement.
Multiple videos of the scrum do appear to show Mr. Lewandowski corralling and later reaching for Ms. Fields, but they walk out of the footage before definitive proof can be obtained. However, the police department did release another overhead video showing some contact.
Wow, Corey Lewandowski, my campaign manager and a very decent man, was just charged with assaulting a reporter. Look at tapes-nothing there!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 29, 2016
Why aren't people looking at this reporters earliest statement as to what happened, that is before she found out the episode was on tape?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 29, 2016
What Trump is referring to is the earlier statement made by Ms. Fields that she was nearly pulled to the ground and barely managed to stay on her feet. Mr. Lewandowski is being represented by Scott Richardson of the law office of Scott N. Richardson, P.A. in West Palm Beach, and Kendall Coffey of Coffey Burlington in Miami. They were not immediately available for comment.
