US President Barack Obama has found Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s 2005 tape that shows him making lewd remarks about women as repugnant, the White House has said.
“The President found the tape as repugnant as most Americans did. And I think there’s been a pretty clear statement by people all along the ideological spectrum that those statements constituted sexual assault,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters yesterday.
“I know you heard from the Vice-President about that over the weekend and that is an observation that we have heard from a wide variety of sources. That is why many people, I believe, have concluded that those statements are worthy of sharp condemnation,” he said.
The current state of affairs in the Republican Party, he said, is a reflection of the work they have done over the past eight years.
“For more than seven years, Republicans in Washington have prioritised opposition to President Obama above all else, above even advancing a conservative agenda that they claim to support,” he said.
“That is why it was not particularly surprising that the base of the Republican Party now has nominated somebody whose notoriety is derived primarily from his colourful opposition to President Obama and is promoting a variety of positions that are not particularly conservative,” Earnest said.
“You reap what you sow. And for seven-and-a-half years, Republicans in Washington have been sowing anti-Obama rhetoric to the exclusion of facts, to the exclusion of any sort of governing agenda, and even to the exclusion of conservative doctrine. That’s why Republican leaders in Washington find themselves in the situation that they’re in right now. It’s not something from which they will quickly recover,” he added.
He said Obama is energised by the Democratic campaign and by the opportunity to advocate for Hillary Clinton’s election.
“The President, in terms of visibly making this argument, is only going to ramp up his activity in the four weeks that remain until the election day,” he said.