Former Vice President Joe Biden said on Thursday evening that if voters believed Tara Reade, the former Senate staffer who has accused him of sexual assault, “they probably shouldn’t vote for me.”
Biden appeared on The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC, and was asked what he would tell people who were struggling with the question of whether to vote for him, given Reade’s accusations (which he denies).
He said:
I think they should vote their heart, and if they believe Tara Reade, they probably shouldn’t vote for me. I wouldn’t vote for me if I believed Tara Reade. The fact is that, look at Tara Reade’s story. It changes considerably. And so — but, I don’t want to question her motive. I don’t want to question anything, other than to say, the truth matters. This is being vetted. It’s been vetted. They went, and people interviewed scores of my employees over my whole career. This is just totally, thoroughly, completely out of character, and the idea that in a public place, in a hallway, I would assault a woman. … I promise you, it never happened. It should be vetted. She should be thoroughly looked at, and whether or not these happened, look at the story, follow the storyline, and determine whether there’s any truth to it, and there is no truth to it. I promise you.
Reade alleges that in 1993, Biden assaulted her in a Senate hallway and forced his fingers inside her. She has filed a complaint with Washington, DC, police.
Biden told O’Donnell that he does not remember Reade.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). His new book, RED NOVEMBER, is available for pre-order. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.