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Were there any deposition transcripts or legal filings where Ivana Trump discussed sexual violence in her marriage?
Executive summary
Available reporting shows Ivana Trump made statements in a 1990s divorce deposition in which she said her then-husband “raped” her and described a violent episode; she later sought to qualify that wording as not meant “in a literal or criminal sense” and said she felt “violated” [1] [2] [3]. Major outlets and books have published accounts or excerpts of the deposition; those accounts were never the subject of criminal adjudication and Ivana later softened the literal criminal meaning of the word in a public clarification [4] [5] [2].
1. What the deposition excerpts say — a direct allegation and descriptive detail
Journalists and authors who obtained or described the 1990 divorce deposition report that Ivana Trump said, in connection with her matrimonial case, that Donald Trump “raped” her — with narrative detail in Harry Hurt III’s Lost Tycoon describing hair-pulling, forced sex and the context of a scalp-reduction surgery — language that the book reproduces from the deposition or its reporting [5] [6] [2].
2. Ivana’s later qualification — “not literal or criminal”
After the Hurt account circulated, a statement attributed to Ivana was added to copies of the book and published reporting noting that she confirmed she had used the word “raped” in a deposition but did not want that to be interpreted “in a literal or criminal sense,” and that “as a woman, I felt violated” [2] [3]. Multiple outlets repeat that she later characterized the term as figurative [4] [5].
3. Which documents and filings are publicly known to exist
Reporting points to a sworn deposition from the divorce proceedings in the early 1990s in which Ivana made the contested language [1] [6]. News organizations and book authors have reported excerpts; however, available sources do not provide the full original court-filed transcript in this collection of search results, and some legal histories note the deposition material circulated via journalists and authors rather than as a widely published court docket entry [7] [5].
4. How news organizations treat the claim — caution and lack of adjudication
Commentators and media outlets note that the allegation “appeared in a deposition but was never factually adjudicated,” and many news organizations emphasize caution because it was not litigated as a criminal charge; reporting stresses the distinction between a deposition statement and a criminal finding [4]. Rolling Stone and other outlets conclude the description in the deposition, as reported, would meet the legal definition of rape even though Ivana later framed her words differently [5].
5. Conflicting framings and potential motives to reword or retract
Sources record that Ivana’s later clarification was obtained or published after pressure from Trump’s side prior to Hurt’s book release, and some commentators describe her qualification as a “non-denial denial” or suggest it may have been tied to divorce settlement dynamics; other reporting presents her statement as a straightforward clarification that she did not intend the term criminally [2] [5] [7]. These competing framings show divergent motives ascribed by reporters and legal commentators.
6. What was not found in the provided reporting
Available sources do not mention that the deposition was the subject of a criminal investigation or prosecution, nor do they provide a complete, publicly posted official transcript from the court records in this result set — reporting relies on excerpts published by authors and journalists [4] [5] [7]. If you seek the verbatim court-filed transcript, available sources do not mention a publicly posted full transcript in these results [8].
7. How to read the record — evidentiary place and limitations
The deposition language, as reported by multiple outlets and a major book, is a sworn statement made during divorce litigation and thus carries significance as contemporaneous testimony, but it was not tried in criminal court and was later publicly qualified by Ivana herself; news coverage repeatedly emphasizes the lack of adjudication and the later clarification from Ivana [4] [2] [3].
If you want the primary materials, the reporting indicates journalists and authors relied on copies of the deposition or excerpts [5] [6]; further legal research could try to locate the original New York matrimonial-filed deposition transcript or contemporaneous court records, noting that some legal summaries treat those deposition excerpts as circulated privately to reporters rather than widely docketed online [7].