09/21/18

President Trump today forcefully defended his Supreme Court pick Brett Kavanaugh, whose nomination is currently in a state of uncertainty. Kavanaugh faces an accusation of sexual assault from decades ago when he was a teenager.

I feel so badly for him that he's going through this, to be honest with you. I feel so badly for him. This is not a man that deserves this. Trump made the comments at a White House news conference with the president of Poland.

NPR's White House reporter Ayesha Rascoe was there. She joins us now. And, Ayesha, the president has defended Kavanaugh before. Was there something different about how he did it today?

It was a bit different because this time, he really kind of went out of his way to express concern for Kavanaugh and what he feels like he's going through. He talked about how he doesn't like the way Kavanaugh has been treated.

He didn't express any type of concern for Christine Blasey Ford, Kavanaugh's accuser. The other times he's been asked about this, Trump has walked a very fine line.

He seems to be kind of trying to make sure he doesn't attack the accuser. Usually in - his instinct is to attack and dismiss allegations against his allies.

But he did go after Democrats for holding back the allegations. And he said that he wants to see this process play out. So I don't want to play into their hands.

Hopefully the woman will come forward, state her case. He will state his case before representatives of the United States Senate, and then they will vote.

If this hearing does go forward - and right now it's supposed to - this is going to be very high stakes for Kavanaugh and for this administration. This is a high-risk situation, and no one really knows how it's going to play out.

The president has been sympathetic to men accused of misconduct in the past. Is he following a pattern essentially? You know, in some ways, this answer that he gave about Kavanaugh - it reminded me of an answer he gave about Rob Porter,