Speaking at press conference on Tuesday with Polish President Andrzej Duda, President Donald Trump expressed support for his embattled Supreme Court nominee. “I feel so badly for him that he is going through this,” Trump said. “Honestly I feel terrible for him, for his wife ... and for his beautiful young daughters. I feel terribly for them.”
Trump expressed the desire to have both Kavanaugh and his accuser Christine Blasey Ford testify in Senate hearings. “Hopefully the woman will come forward, state her case,” the president remarked. “He will state his case before representatives of the United States Senate. And then they will vote, they will look at his career, they will look at what she had to say from 36 years ago, and we will see what happens.”
Trump has a long history of defending male associates accused of gender-based abuse or sexual misconduct (as well as defending himself from such charges). About his former White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter, who was accused of assaulting two of his ex-wives and a girlfriend, Trump said, “He said very strongly yesterday that he’s innocent but you’ll have to talk to him about that.”
About onetime Republican senatorial candidate Roy Moore, who was accused of molesting a teenager and trying to seek physical relations with more, Trump said, “He totally denies it. He says it didn’t happen.” Trump has made similar arguments on behalf of disgraced former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly and the late disgraced former Fox News executive Roger Ailes.
At the time of accusations against Porter, Trump tweeted:
Peoples lives are being shattered and destroyed by a mere allegation. Some are true and some are false. Some are old and some are new. There is no recovery for someone falsely accused - life and career are gone. Is there no such thing any longer as Due Process?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 10, 2018
There is a revealing passage in Bob Woodward’s book Fear where he reports on advice Trump gives “to a friend who had acknowledged some bad behavior toward women.”
According to Woodward, Trump said, “You’ve got to deny, deny, deny and push back on these women. If you admit to anything and any culpability, then you’re dead. That was a big mistake you made. You didn’t come out guns blazing and just challenging them. You showed weakness. You’ve got to be strong. You’ve got to be aggressive. You’ve got to push back hard. You’ve got to deny anything that’s said about you. Never admit.”