Biden denies sex-assault claim
In interview, he claims ‘inconsistencies’ in accuser’s account
WASHINGTON — Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden on Friday emphatically denied allegations from a former Senate staffer that he sexually assaulted her in the early 1990s, declaring flatly that “this never happened.”
Biden’s first public remarks on the accusation by a former employee, Tara Reade, come at a critical moment for the presumptive Democratic nominee as he tries to relieve mounting pressure after weeks of leaving denials to his campaign.
“I’m saying unequivocally, it never, never happened,” the former vice president and senator said in an interview on MSNBC’S “Morning Joe.”
Biden said he will ask the National Archives to determine whether there is any record of a complaint being filed, as Reade has claimed.
He said the Archives was the only possible place a complaint would be, and that his Senate papers held under seal at the University of Delaware do not contain personnel records.
“The former staffer has said she filed a complaint back in 1993,”
Biden said. “But she does not have a record of this alleged complaint.”
Reade did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. The Archives deflected inquiries to Capitol Hill: “Any records of Senate personnel complaints from 1993 would have remained under the control of the Senate.”
Senate officials did not immediately respond to a request for information.
Biden, in his TV interview, said “there are so many inconsistencies” in Reade’s various accounts. But he also said he does not “question her motive.” He said that over his five decades in public life, none of his employees was asked to sign a nondisclosure agreement.
President Donald Trump is stepping delicately around the Biden controversy.
“He’s going to have to make his own decision,” Trump said in a podcast interview Friday with Dan Bongino. “I’m not going to be telling him what to do.”
The president added that it would be a “great thing” if Biden had records that could “dispose” of Reade’s allegation.
Trump joined fellow Republicans in arguing that Democrats aren’t being consistent, pointing again Friday to the aggressive questioning of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh when he faced an allegation of sexual assault.
Biden said Friday that women “should start off with the presumption they are telling the truth. Then you have to look at the circumstances and the facts. And the facts of this case do not exist.”
Trump’s re-election campaign quickly released a digital ad featuring prominent Democrats, including Biden and Hillary Clinton saying, “Believe women” and similar sentiments.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we just can’t have it both ways,” Trump spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway said at the White House. “We cannot decide which women were included in ‘believe all women.’”