Trump deflects questions on sex allegations facing Moore
WASHINGTON – President Trump said Saturday that he’s been too busy with his whirlwind Asia trip to pay much attention to allegations that Senate candidate Roy Moore sexually assaulted young women decades ago, but he stood by a previous White House statement that Moore will “do the right thing.”
Traveling on Air Force One in Vietnam between Da Nang and the capital city, Hanoi, Trump twice deflected questions about the growing pressure on Moore to drop out of the Alabama Senate race.
“I’ll stick with statement for now, but I’ll have further comment as we go down the road. I have to get back into the country to see what’s happening,” he said.
That statement, delivered through press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said Trump believes that “we cannot allow a mere allegation — in this case, one from many years ago — to destroy a person’s life.” But she also said that if the allegations are true, “Judge Moore will do the right thing and step aside.”
Moore is a former Alabama Supreme Court chief justice who defeated Trump’s preferred candidate, Sen. Luther Strange, in the Republican primary to replace Jeff Sessions, who became Trump’s attorney general.
But Moore was thrust into the growing national controversy over sexual misconduct after five women told the Washington Post that Moore acted inappropriately toward them in the 1970s, including sexual contact with a 14- year- old in 1979 — when he was a 32- year- old prosecutor.
Speaking to Fox News on Friday, Moore gave vague denials of the allegations.
“I’m not going to dispute anything, but I don’t remember anything like that,” he said. “I don’t remember dating any girl without the permission of her mother.”
Trump had shifted his support to Moore after the primary. But other prominent Republicans, including Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee have withdrawn support.