Joe Biden on Friday categorically denied the sexual assault allegation threatening to disrupt his presidential campaign, breaking weeks of silence on the issue, reports CNBC.
“I’m saying unequivocally that it never, never happened,” Biden said in an interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
Tara Reade, a former Senate aide, claims that Biden assaulted her in 1993 when she worked in his office.
Biden’s campaign had previously denied the allegation, but pressure had been mounting for the candidate to address the claim himself. In a statement released just before the interview, Biden cited “the full and growing record of inconsistencies” in the accusations and said: “They aren’t true. This never happened.”
Live now on @Morning_Joe. pic.twitter.com/kCklFS4kAP— MSNBC (@MSNBC) May 1, 2020
Reade shook up Biden’s presidential campaign in March when she claimed on a podcast that Biden pinned her to a wall and used his fingers to penetrate her in an office building on Capitol Hill when he was a senator from Delaware.
Reade’s brother and a former neighbor have said that Reade discussed details of the alleged assault with them in the 1990s. Several individuals who worked in the Senate office at the time have said that Reade’s allegations do not square with their experience working for Biden.
Reade has said she filed a written complaint at the time, though it has not been located. Many of the records from Biden’s senate office remain under seal at the University of Delaware until Biden retires from public life. In his Friday statement, Biden said the archive does not contain personnel files.
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