With Joe Biden facing a sexual assault accusation from a former staffer who not only remembers the date, location, and who she told – and that there was penetration, Democrats who condemned Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh over allegations which were devoid of the same level of specificity have come under fire for their utter silence, or defense, of Biden.
Both Biden and Kavanaugh have faced decades-old charges that first became public at critical junctures in their pursuit of high political office.
Top Democrats who were on the front lines demanding justice for Christine Blasey Ford during the Kavanaugh hearings have rushed to defend Biden, saying they do not believe the allegations made against him by Tara Reade.
And while the news media printed salacious new allegations against Kavanaugh before vetting the accusers or their claims, media outlets have approached Reade’s allegations with extreme caution. –The Hill
Indeed, the standard of “believe all women” set by Democrats themselves has been utterly abandoned, highlighting what a giant virtue signal it was in the first place.
“There is a clear double standard between how the media and Democrats treated Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s allegations versus Tara Reade’s allegations,” said Mike Davis, president of the Article III Project, which advised the Senate on Kavanaugh’s nomination.
“It was stunning to see Democrats say they believed Joe Biden even before he’d spoken a word about this,” he added. “And the media instantly and breathlessly reported on all of the allegations against Justice Kavanaugh, which resulted in three criminal referrals against accusers for conspiracy to lie to Congress.”
In stark contrast to Biden’s accuser, top Democrats demanded that Kavanaugh remove himself from consideration to the Supreme Court – participating in Capitol Hill protests and fundraising off the hearings which became a key issue for liberals ahead of the 2018 midterms in which Democrats won back the house, notes The Hill.
Privately, some Democrats are now lamenting the standard they set in 2018, saying it has backfired now that Biden has been accused.
“We set up a standard we can’t live by. No one likes to discuss it but it’s the reality,” said one Democratic strategist who requested anonymity to talk candidly. “It looks terrible for him and for the party. You can’t say you believe women and then take it all back because it doesn’t apply to you.”
Blasey Ford accused Kavanaugh of assaulting her in the early 1980s when they were both in high school. Reade accused Biden of assaulting her in the early 1990s when she worked in his Senate office.
Biden and Kavanaugh have both strenuously denied the allegations against them. –The Hill
In 2018, Biden said that if a woman comes forth “in the glaring lights of focus,” you’ve got to “start off with the presumption that at least the essense of what she is talking about is real.”
When asked by MSNBC‘s Mika Brzezinski on Friday if all women are to be believed “unless it pertains to you,” Biden said that women should be “given the benefitt of the doubt,” and should “start off with the presumption they’re telling the truth.”
BUT…
“Then you have to look at the circumstances and the facts,” Biden continued – with a giant caveat absent from his Kavanaugh condemnation. “And the facts in this case do not exist. They never happened, and there’s so many inconsistencies in what has been said in this case. So yes, look at the facts and I assure you it did not happen, period. Period.”
Meanwhile, the MSM’s coverage of Kavanaugh is coming under new scrutiny, as several allegations with virtually no evidence were breathlessly promoted – including an allegation of gang rape made by Michael Avenatti client Julie Swetnick, which resulted in a criminal referral for conspiracy to lie to Congress.
With Reade, however, most of the MSM waited a full three weeks after her March 25 accusation to even cover the story.
In fact, the only outlet that would have Reade on is Fox News, where she will appear on Sunday to address her claims. Reade, a Democrat, told New York Times media critic Ben Smith that she wanted to avoid the outlet over concerns that it would make her allegations appear political, but that she was left with no option after other cable ad broadcast outlets refused to reach out.
“Absolutely there’s been a disparity in the way the media has approached these two cases,” said Boston University professor Tobe Berkovitz, who specializes in political communications. “The burden of proof has not been the same. And granted, right now you have COVID-19 as the story that is always going to be the lead, but you’d think after that you’d see more about Reade’s allegations. It just hasn’t been a big story.”
Meanwhile, President Trump and other Republicans have called out the left over their diametrically opposed coverage of the accusations.
“I look at the double standard,” Trump said on Friday, “You look at Biden and nobody even wants to bring up the subject.”
Meanwhile, the left is now engaging in the very ‘whataboutism’ they said was off limits in political debate:
MSNBC anchor Nicolle Wallace said it’s a double standard for Republicans to try and create an “equal playing field” between Trump and Biden, when Trump has been accused by many more women.
“The right isn’t running an intellectually honest operation to get to the bottom of whether Tara Reade was victimized,” Wallace said. “The right is running a smear campaign against Joe Biden.”
The Trump campaign released a new digital ad accusing Democrats of hypocrisy on the issue. The National Republican Congressional Committee released scores of press releases on Friday highlighting remarks from vulnerable Democrats who demanded Kavanaugh step aside but have been quiet about the allegations against Biden. –The Hill
“It’s a bit of a Pandora’s Box we opened on this one,” one Democratic fundraiser told The Hill. “A perfect trap and we stepped right into it.“