How was Rob Porter allowed to keep his job?

Columnist Ruth Marcus writes about the White House aide who has been accused of abuse by two ex-wives.

Look at the picture. Really. Look at the picture. The women’s eye socket is the sickly green-yellow of a healing bruise. Around the eyelid, and in a sickening swoosh underneath, there is the deep plum of blood pooling around broken capillaries.

The picture (bit.ly/2E9rxfm), if you haven’t seen it, shows Colbie Holderness, one of two exwives who have accused former senior White House aide Rob Porter of physically abusing them. Porter, in the statement announcing his resignation Wednesday, declared that “these outrageous allegations are simply false. I took the photos given to the media nearly 15 years ago, and the reality behind them is nowhere close to what is being described.”

OK, then, explain the photo, which Holderness says was taken after Porter punched her in the face on a trip to Florence. Bruises like this are not self-inflicted. Why does it matter who took the photo? The question is: Who committed this assault?

Explain Holderness’ description to the Daily Mail, which broke the story, of how, on their honeymoon, Porter “was angry because we weren’t having sex when he wanted to have sex and he kicked me. ... That was the first time he hurt me, and then the doors opened. I didn’t do anything, and it continued.” It always does, by the way. Once is never enough for abusers.

Explain the request for an emergency protective order from Jennifer Willoughby, Porter’s second wife, after, she said, Porter “punched in the glass on the door” of their apartment when he refused to leave, in violation of their separation agreement. Explain the finding that “reasonable grounds exist to believe that [Porter] has committed family abuse and there is probable danger of a further such offense.” Explain Willoughby’s description, in a blog post, of how her husband “pulled me, naked and dripping, from the shower to yell at me.”

Explain how this man could have been allowed to work at the White House after his exwives described this abusive behavior to the FBI.

Explain how White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, who reportedly knew of the FBI reports, could assert, in a statement circulated before and after the abuse photos emerged, that “Rob Porter is a man of true integrity and honor, and I can’t say enough good things about him. He is a friend, a confidante and a trusted professional.”

Yes, true integrity. Take a look at that photo, Gen. Kelly, and tell me how a man of integrity behaves.

Explain, finally, how the White House, with this information public, could allow a man facing these allegations to continue, even for a single additional day, to work there.

Let me proffer two categories of explanation. The first involves the reflexive tribalism of any entity, especially one that feels itself under siege. The Trump administration suffers from a singularly morally bankrupt strain of this tribalism, in which loyalty to Trump is prized above all else and failings are ignored, especially failings that echo those of the president himself.

But there is another phenomenon at work here that goes beyond the see-no-evil enablers of the Trump administration. It involves our continued societal resistance to the notion that domestic abuse knows no class barriers — that the best and the brightest are among the perpetrators. The wifebeater shirt can equally be a pinstripe suit.

Consider Porter, the seeming golden boy. Harvard College. Rhodes scholar. Republican bona fides (his father, Roger, worked for President George H.W. Bush; Rob served as chief of staff to Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch) to match what the Deseret News called his “strong Latter-day Saint pedigree.” A man like that wouldn’t abuse his wife, would he?

I learned differently, early in my career, writing about the case of John Fedders, who resigned as enforcement chief at the Securities and Exchange Commission in 1985, after his wife accused him of years of beatings. “It happens to all classes of people,” a domestic abuse counselor told me then. “It’s just that when you have that much land around your house, the screams are not heard by the neighbors.”

The related delusion is that private behavior has no public relevance, that the two can be conveniently separated. Indeed, Willoughby herself expressed this view. “I have the utmost respect for him professionally,” she told The Intercept. “If there was to be a staff secretary in the Trump administration, I hope to God it is Rob.”

Not me. Not anyone who understands the true meaning of integrity.