Katie wrote about the Trump’s campaign rather bold move to hold a press conference with the four women who have accused the Clintons of mistreating them over past allegations of sexual abuse. Most have accused the former president of sexually assaulting them; another—Kathy Shelton—was a victim of a rapist who Clinton defended early in her law career. She described being dragged through hell by the former first lady who got her attacker off on lesser charge through a technicality. Shelton was only 12-years-old at the time.
To kick it up a notch, Trump wanted to put these women in his family’s box at the debate last night, but security threatened to removed them (via WaPo):
Donald Trump’s campaign sought to intimidate Hillary Clinton and embarrass her husband by seating women who have accused former president Bill Clinton of sexual abuse in the Trump family’s box at the presidential debate here Sunday night, according to four people involved in the discussions.The campaign’s plan, which was closely held and unknown to several of Trump’s top aides, was thwarted just minutes before it could be executed when officials with the Commission on Presidential Debates intervened. The commission officials warned that, if the Trump campaign tried to seat the accusers in the elevated family box, security officers would remove the women, according to the people involved, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the discussions were confidential.
[…]
“We were going to put the four women in the VIP box,” said former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who represents Trump in debate negotiations. “We had it all set. We wanted to have them shake hands with Bill, to see if Bill would shake hands with them.”
[…]
Frank J. Fahrenkopf, the debate commission’s co-chairman and a former Republican National Committee chairman, caught wind of the plot on Sunday and immediately moved to put an end to it. Fahrenkopf tartly warned a Trump staffer that if the campaign tried to put the four women in the family box, security personnel would remove them, according to people with direct knowledge of the conversations.
“Fahrenkopf said, ‘no’ — verbally said ‘no,’ that ‘security would throw them out,’” Giuliani said.
Frankly, it wasn’t needed, as Trump has a much better debate performance than many had originally projected, including myself. He obviously prepared, was calm, collected, and delivered some tough remarks about Clinton’s role in health care policy, foreign policy, her emails, and taxes. He still needs to work on pivoting and delivering his attacks with more efficiency, but it wasn’t a disaster. His campaign meltdown seems to have been stopped, though the damage from the leaked 2005 tape, where the Republican nominee can be heard making very crude remarks about groping women seems to have take its toll. Clinton is ahead by double-digits.
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