Leigh Corfman, a woman who says Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore took advantage of her when she was a teenager, shared her ordeal with TODAY show anchor Savannah Guthrie. Their interview aired Monday morning.
When she was 14, Corfman told Guthrie, a 32-year-old Moore confronted her outside of an Alabama courthouse and asked her back to his house.
“I wouldn’t exactly call it a date," she said. "I would say it was a meet. At 14 I was not dating. At 14, I was not able to make those kind of choices."
Moore had spread blankets on the floor and proceeded to "seduce" her, Corfman recalled. She did not consider it harassment at the time because that was "not part of her vocabulary" at that age.
Guthrie asked Corfman if she was being compensated for now telling her story.
"Absolutely not," she said. "If anything this has cost me. I've had to take leave from my job. I have no tickets to Tahiti."
Guthrie also asked Corfman to share her political inclinations, to which she replied she has voted Republican for years. This isn't politics she said, "it's personal."
As for why she did not come forward until now, Corfman told Guthrie that she had every intention of walking into the Alabama courthouse to confront him years ago, but "her children were small at the time" and she wanted to protect them. The second time, she told her children what happened but they were afraid they'd be "castigated" in their social groups by what had happened so they decided not to speak out. It wasn't until the Washington Post sought her out that she told her story.
Corfman is one of nine women to accuse Moore of sexual misconduct. The Senate candidate denies wrongdoing. Yet, in light of the scandal, top Republicans like Mitch McConnell have asked him to step aside to make way for a Republican candidate with less baggage.
On Fox News Sunday, Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) asked him to "find something else to do."
“The allegations are stronger than the denial, and Roy Moore should find something else to do. I think that there’s a strong possibility with a new Republican candidate, a proven conservative, that we can win that race in Alabama."
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