Rumors had circulated about such an event for years and it had been recorded in a letter prepared by a Republican rival of Clinton's around 1991, but Broaddrick refused to speak to news media until 1999.
In a sworn statement in 1997 with the placeholder name "Jane Doe #5",[3] Broaddrick filed an affidavit with Paula Jones's lawyers stating there were unfounded rumors and stories circulating "that Mr. Clinton had made unwelcome sexual advances toward me in the late seventies.
Broaddrick, who was known as Juanita Hickey at the time, first met Clinton when he made a visit to her nursing home during his 1978 gubernatorial campaign.
[5] Broaddrick said the two spoke briefly in her room, with Clinton describing plans he had to renovate a prison visible from her window if he became governor.
Rogers attended a conference seminar that morning, and says she returned to their room to find Broaddrick on the bed "in a state of shock", with her pantyhose torn in the crotch and her lip swollen as though she had been hit.
Three other friends confirmed that Broaddrick had told them about the incident at the time: Susan Lewis; Louis Ma; and Jean Darden, Norma Rogers' sister.
[23] This, along with the discrepancy between the letter and Broaddrick's affidavit, attracted the attention of independent counsel Kenneth Starr, who was investigating Clinton for obstruction of justice.
[3] However, she insisted that Clinton had not pressured or bribed her in any way, and so Starr concluded that the story was not relevant to his investigation and his report only mentioned the recanting in a footnote.
Broaddrick was upset by a tabloid report that she had been paid to keep quiet, and decided to agree to an interview with NBC's Lisa Myers.
NBC was accused of intentionally sitting on the story and invoking unusually demanding standards of corroboration until the impeachment process ended.
[14] While NBC waited to air the interview, Broaddrick was approached by Dorothy Rabinowitz, who wrote for the Wall Street Journal editorial page.
Upset with NBC's delay, Broaddrick agreed to speak with Rabinowitz, and the story debuted on the Wall Street Journal's editorial page on February 19.
"[14] In March 1999 Slate magazine ran a much-cited[citation needed] article called "Is Juanita Broaddrick Telling the Truth?
This argument proposes that Rogers and Darden may have developed a grudge against Clinton; in 1980 as governor, he had commuted the life sentence of Guy Lavern Kuehn, the man who murdered their father in 1971.
While Christopher Hitchens' 1999 book, No One Left to Lie To, argued that Broaddrick's claim was credible and shows similarities to Paula Jones' later allegation of sexual harassment,[30] Michael Isikoff's book, Uncovering Clinton, said that Clinton's lawyers figured that he might well have had consensual, extramarital sex with Broaddrick, but they did not believe he would have forced himself on her,[17] and Joe Conason and Gene Lyons' 2004 book The Hunting of the President argued that Broaddrick's claim is not credible, noting that the FBI had found evidence for the allegations inconclusive.
The judge ruled that the Privacy Act did not apply in this case and that Broaddrick had failed to show evidence that the U.S. Department of Justice had improperly released documents about her.
[15] Broaddrick resurrected her rape claims on Twitter during the United States presidential election of 2016, as Hillary Clinton was the Democratic nominee for president.
In an October 2016 recap of the case, Dylan Matthews of Vox said: "The basic answer is that some of the claims [against Bill Clinton] appear more credible than others.
Matthews continues: "Given the prevailing view among many progressives—including Hillary Clinton—that one should default to believing rape accusers, the Broaddrick allegation thus poses a problem.
"[17] Michelle Goldberg of Slate wrote in a late 2015 essay, "our rules for talking about sexual assault have changed since the 1990s, when these women were last in the news.
Today, feminists have repeatedly and convincingly made the case that when women say they've been sexually assaulted, we should assume they're telling the truth.
"[35] Many conservative commentators who were typically quite skeptical of sexual assault claims without firm evidence, found Broaddrick's allegations quite believable.
As Katie J. M. Baker of BuzzFeed News lamented, "In theory, partisan politics shouldn't play a role in determining whether an alleged rape victim deserves to be heard.
"[15] When in late 2015, during a town hall event during her presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton was asked about the allegation, and she responded: "Well, I would say that everybody should be believed at first until they are disbelieved based on evidence.
[39][40] On October 9 Broaddrick appeared on a panel with Trump, Paula Jones, and Kathleen Willey (a fourth woman at the panel, Kathy Shelton, had an unrelated grievance against Hillary Clinton) an hour before the second debate between Trump and Clinton in the general election portion of the United States presidential election debates, 2016.
[43] In 2017, in the wake of Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse allegations, Broaddrick criticized 1990s Bill Clinton paramour Monica Lewinsky for aligning herself with the #MeToo movement, saying, "I have always felt sad for you, but where were you when we needed you?"
"[17] Caitlin Flanagan of The Atlantic wrote "Yet let us not forget the sex crimes of which the younger, stronger Bill Clinton was very credibly accused in the 1990s.
Juanita Broaddrick, most prominently, said that he raped her very violently in a way that is quite like the Harvey Weinstein accusations in terms of the hotel room and the suddenness and the bleak horror of it all.
"[49] In January 2018 Broaddrick self-published a memoir, co-authored by Nick Lulli, with the title You'd Better Put Some Ice On That: How I Survived Being Raped By Bill Clinton.
"[53] Since the 2016 election, Broaddrick has been increasingly politically active in support of Donald Trump,[15] the Republican Party, and conservative groups.