Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday she doesn’t see a role for Congress to respond to the latest sexual assault allegation against President Trump, saying the president’s own party should address the matter.
During a press conference at the Capitol, a reporter asked Pelosi about an accusation from magazine writer E. Jean Carroll last week that Trump assaulted her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in Manhattan 23 years ago.
Two women came forward to The New York Times in a story published earlier Thursday affirming that Carroll confided in them about her story of assault in the 1990s.
{mosads}Pelosi said she respects women who come forward with allegations, but acknowledged she hasn’t been following the case closely. She added that she doesn’t see where Congress would come in, instead attempting to shift the onus on Republicans to hold Trump accountable on the sexual misconduct allegations.
“Lord knows, I respect the concerns that are expressed by women as they present their truth, their case,” Pelosi said. “I don’t know what Congress’s role would be in this. But in any of these things this isn’t about what Congress would do. This is about what the president’s own party would do. You’d really have to ask them.”
The question about Carroll’s allegation comes as lawmakers wrangle over funding for federal agencies at the U.S.-Mexico border and amid bubbling calls from Democrats to launch an impeachment inquiry against Trump based on details outlined in former special counsel Robert Mueller’s report.
House Democrats currently face an impasse with the Senate over a $4.5 billion package to provide resources for agencies handling the influx of migrants at the southern border amid documentation of unsanitary and overcrowded conditions at holding facilities.
“I’m more concerned about policy decisions that we have disagreements on, that we need to come to agreement on, that affect the lives of the American people,” Pelosi said. “I just am not following it that closely.”
“I’m busy worrying about children not being in their mother’s arms because of policies that we may have,” Pelosi said.
Democrats have expressed an interest in conducting an investigation into previous sexual misconduct allegations against Trump.
Back in 2017, while House Democrats were in the minority, many called on the House Oversight and Reform Committee to investigate past allegations. The committee’s chairman at the time, former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), declined to pursue an investigation.
But now, Democrats say they’re more occupied by other investigations into the Trump administration. The Hill spoke to Democrats earlier this year who said it’s less of a priority at this point.
Trump has denied the allegation from Carroll, telling The Hill in an interview earlier this week that she’s “not my type.”
Three of Trump’s accusers who called for a congressional investigation in 2017 told The Hill that they’d still like to see it happen and would be willing to testify.
Pelosi previously endorsed the effort in 2017 to investigate allegations against Trump from before he took office, signaling support for those calling for the House Oversight and Reform Committee to look into the allegations.
“I don’t think that a person who has been a sexual harasser should be president of the United States but there is — hopefully the committee will do the investigation,” Pelosi told reporters at the time.