Trump backs out of trip to support Senate hopeful accused of abuse

DONALD TRUMP has decided not to campaign for Judge Roy Moore, the controversial Republican Senate candidate who has been accused of molesting teenage girls.

Mr Moore, 70, is set to contest a special election in Alabama on Dec 12 as the official Republican candidate, and President Trump had indicated he was considering sharing a stage with him despite the allegations.

The president’s change of heart came as the issue of sexual harassment took centre stage in Washington.

Al Franken, a high-profile Democrat senator, apologised publicly over allegations he groped women while having his photograph taken with them.

Mr Franken said: “I know I let a lot of people down. Everyone counted on me to be a champion for women and I’m going to work to regain their trust. I am going to be accountable.”

In a separate controversy, Mr Trump himself was accused of privately claiming that an infamous audio tape, in which he boasted about groping women, was fake.

Mr Trump told a senator, and one of his own advisers, that the tape, broadcast during the election, was “not authentic,” The New York Times reported.

He was said to have made the claims despite previously admitting the voice on the tape was his.

Mr Trump made further headlines last night when he referred to Senator Elizabeth Warren, a potential Democrat presidential nominee in 2020, as “Pocahontas” at an event honouring American Indian “code talkers” who served in the Second World War. Mr Trump has frequently used the nickname in reference to Mrs Warren’s claimed American Indian heritage.

In Alabama, Mr Moore was facing allegations that he sexually molested or assaulted girls aged 14 and 16. Several other women have accused him of pursuing romantic relationships with them when they were teenagers and he was a lawyer in his thirties. He denies all the allegations and has argued that he is the victim of a liberal witch hunt.

The usually safe Republican seat is now on a knife-edge, and losing it would rob the party of one of their 52 seats in the 100-seat US Senate, leaving a wafer-thin majority that makes it increasingly difficult for Mr Trump to achieve his legislative agenda.

Many senior Republican figures have already distanced themselves from Mr Moore despite the consequences in Congress that his defeat would bring.

However, Mr Trump had appeared to be sticking with the embattled candidate, and last week publicly raised doubts about the accounts of women who had accused Mr Moore. “He denies it. He totally denies it. That’s all I can say,” the president said.

Mr Trump was also said to have been irritated when Ivanka, his daughter, publicly attacked Mr Moore, saying there was a “special place in hell for people who prey on children”.

The president was said to have asked an adviser “Do you believe this?” when he saw his daughter’s comments.

For days Mr Trump continued to leave open the door to campaigning on Mr Moore’s behalf, but last night a White House official confirmed that the president would not go to Alabama.