JOE RAEDLE VIA GETTY IMAGES
WASHINGTON― Multiple female Fox News employees have offered detailed, horrifying accounts of sexual abuse by former Fox chief Roger Ailes. But Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump remains skeptical of their allegations, and said last week that if his daughter Ivanka were sexually harassed at work in the way these women describe, he hopes she would simply find another job.
“I would like to think she would find another career or find another company if that was the case,” he told USA Today columnist Kirsten Powers in a phone interview.
Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson filed a lawsuit against Ailes in July, claiming that he made sexual advances toward her and then when she resisted he retaliated by cutting her salary and on-air appearances and eventually terminating her contract. Since Carlson came forward, several more women have accused Ailes of harassment, including one booker for the conservative cable network who described his years of sexual abuse as “psychological torture.” Ailes resigned following the allegations, but he continues to deny them.
Trump told NBC’s Chuck Todd last week that it’s “very sad” the women are complaining about Ailes, who he called a “good person” and “very talented.”
“I can tell you that some of the woman that are complaining, I know how much he’s helped them. And even recently,” Trump said. “And when they write books that are fairly recently released, and they say wonderful things about him. And now, all of a sudden, they’re saying these horrible things about him. It’s very sad.”
What is even more sad is Trump’s failure to realize that when men with authority abuse their power, it too often entrenches a culture of fear, silence and powerlessness.
