Trump attacks senator, blames Democrats

WASHINGTON — President Trump aggressively returned to the issue of sexual harassment Tuesday, again dismissing his own accusers as fabricators and attacking a female Democratic senator as a “lightweight” who “would do anything” for campaign contributions.

The president’s attacks came in early morning Twitter posts after three of the accusers had come forward Monday to renew their charges from last year that Trump had sexually assaulted them before he entered politics, and after the senator, Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., had called for him to resign.

While Trump weathered the accusations during his presidential campaign, the flood of recent allegations against powerful men has revived the issue of sexual harassment with a newfound fury. By inserting himself directly into the discussion, the president ensured that calls for renewed scrutiny of the women’s allegations would gain new energy and prominence.

Gillibrand was quick to fire back, saying she would not be silenced by a president whose comments she described as “a sexist smear.”

“It was a sexist smear attempting to silence my voice, and I will not be silenced on this issue,” she said. “Neither will the women who stood up to the president yesterday,” she added.

Gillibrand first learned of the president’s Twitter post while she was attending a bipartisan Bible study Tuesday morning, one of her aides said. The aide also said that Gillibrand had met with Trump just once in his office, several years ago, and that his daughter Ivanka was at the meeting.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, later denied that Trump’s tweet contained a sexual reference, saying that he was referring to general corruption in the U.S. political system.

Asked whether the president would apologize to people who read the tweet as sexual innuendo, Sanders said he would not. “Only if your mind is in the gutter would you have read it that way,” she said.

Senate Democrats, including Gillibrand, forced the resignation last week of Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., clearing away any ambiguity over their push to hold the president accountable after the claims of his accusers. About 60 Democratic women in Congress demanded an inquiry into the women’s allegations against the president, an unlikely prospect given Republican majorities in the House and Senate.