President Donald Trump defended Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh while fielding questions from reporters in front of the White House on Tuesday by claiming that young men in America are under attack.
"It is a very scary time for young men in America. You can be accused before you prove your innocence," Trump told the reporters, according to The Hill. When asked if he had a message for young women, Trump replied that "women are doing great."
Trump later reiterated his sentiments about the tribulations facing young men in modern America.
"Well I say that it's a very scary time for young men in America when you can be guilty of something that you may not be guilty of. This is a very, very... This is a very difficult time," Trump told the assembled reporters.
Women, he said, “are doing great.”
When Trump was asked about reports which indicate that Kavanaugh may have lied to Congress, the president replied that "I don't think you should lie to Congress and there have been a lot of people over the last year that have lied to Congress, and to me that would not be acceptable."
Despite implicitly criticizing Kavanaugh in his response to the question about the potential lies to the Senate, Trump nevertheless praised the judge about his overall performance during the hearings.
"Judge Kavanaugh is doing pretty well, it seems to me, over the last 24 hours," Trump told the reporters. "A lot is going to depend on what comes back from the FBI in terms of their additional, number seven investigation. But I think that Judge Kavanaugh is doing very well right now."
He later added, "We spoke and that's moving along nicely but I don't want to interrupt what's going on with Judge Kavanaugh. I don't want to do anything to interrupt what's happening with Judge Kavanaugh and I think the process, hopefully as Mitch said, they'll have a vote by the end of the week and it will be a positive vote. But it will be dependent on what comes back from the FBI. The FBI is working, they're working very hard, and let's see what happens."
The president also cast Kavanaugh in the role of victim with regard to his plight getting confirmed.
"I think he was fighting people that were making very tough charges against him. And I thought he did very well, I really did. I thought he did very well. He's fighting very hard for his reputation, for his family. I thought what happened was really tough. It was tough stuff. I've been watching this stuff for a long time. I've never seen anything like going on with respect to Judge Kavanaugh. This is a high quality person. This is a number one student, a top intellect," Trump told the reporters. He then chided the press for not focusing enough on Kavanaugh's judicial record, arguing that "if there's one disappointment — I don't think that you people have covered an aspect that's very important, very very important — and that's what he's done over the last thirty years."
Shares