TRUMP MOCKS TESTIMONY
President made the comments at a rally in Mississippi
President Trump described what he called holes in Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony.
SOUTHAVEN, Miss. — President Donald Trump ignited a crowd at a campaign rally in Mississippi Tuesday by mocking a woman who has claimed she was sexually assaulted by Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh decades ago.
The audience laughed as Trump ran through a list of what he described as holes in Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. She testified that Kavanaugh pinned her on a bed, tried to take off her clothes and covered her mouth in the early 1980s, when the two were teenagers. Kavanaugh has denied Ford’s allegations.
“How did you get home? ‘I don’t remember,’ ” Trump said at the rally in Southaven. “How did you get there? ‘I don’t remember.’ Where is the place? ‘I don’t remember.’ How many years ago was it? ‘I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.’”
Imitating Ford, he added, “But I had one beer — that’s the only thing I remember.”
It marked the sharpest criticism by Trump of Ford since she came forward publicly with the allegation last month.
Ford’s lawyer Michael Bromwich called Trump’s attack “vicious, vile and soulless.”
“Is it any wonder that she was terrified to come forward, and that other sexual assault survivors are, as well?” Bromwich tweeted. “She is a remarkable profile in courage. He is a profile in cowardice.”
The president was in Mississippi on Tuesday looking to sway the outcome of a low-profile election that could tip the balance of the Senate.
As Republicans fight headwinds ahead of the Nov. 6 midterm election, Trump sought to rally support behind GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, appointed to fill the seat of Republican Thad Cochran, who retired in April. She faces Republican Chris McDaniel, and Democrats Mike Espy and Tobey Bernard Bartee in next month’s special election for the rest of the two-year term.