Bush Sr tells joke as gropes

UNITED STATES: George H W Bush, the former US president, has been accused of groping by a second woman who said he also made a joke about a ‘‘copping a feel’’.

Jordana Grolnick, a theatre actress, claimed Bush, 93, was a ‘‘dirty old man’’ who grabbed her from behind while he was in his wheelchair.

The incident happened during the taking of a group photograph with Bush and his wife Barbara last year at the Ogunquit Playhouse in Maine, where the actress was appearing in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

‘‘We all circled around him and Barbara for a photo and I was right next to him,’’ Grolnick said.

‘‘He reached his right hand around to my behind and as we smiled for the photo he asked the group, ‘Do you want to know who my favourite magician is?’ As I felt his hand dig into my flesh, he said ‘David Cop-a-feel!’’’

Grolnick said others laughed politely out of ‘‘discomfort’’ and Barbara Bush then said: ‘‘He’s going to get himself put into jail.’’ The actress said she at first ‘‘laughed off’’ the incident but changed her mind after the recent slew of sexual harassment allegations against Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood mogul.

A spokesman for Bush said: ‘‘He has been confined to a wheelchair for roughly five years so his arm falls on the lower waist of people with whom he takes pictures. To try to put people at ease the president routinely tells the same joke.

‘‘And, on occasion, he has patted women’s rears in what he intended to be a good-natured manner.’’ – Telegraph Group