密歇根州州长为乔·拜登的性侵犯指控辩护，州长格雷琴·威特默，一名强奸幸存者，说她审查了指控并相信拜登。Michael brochstein/echos wire/barcroft media by Getty images

这位指责乔·拜登1993年在参议院办公楼袭击她的女性首次公开发表评论，因为前副总统上周坚决否认了她的指控，称她希望拜登退出2020年的总统竞选。

“你和我都在场，乔·拜登，请站出来，接受问责。你不应该竞选美国总统的角色，”塔拉·里德在周四与记者梅根·凯利在网上发布的采访片段中说。

"我希望他会，但他不会，"当被问及是否希望拜登结束竞选时，里德说。"我希望他会，这就是我的情感感受。"

过去几周，里德对拜登的指控断断续续地浮出水面，特朗普总统的助手和亲戚大力宣传。自拜登上周否认后，周四对凯利的采访标志着她第一次在镜头前谈论这些指控。

1993年，56岁的里德在拜登的办公室担任了一段时间的初级参议院助理。她在接受美国广播公司新闻和其他媒体采访时声称，拜登的助手让她在参议院办公楼里亲手将一个运动包交给他，当她这么做的时候，她声称他靠近了，把她钉在墙上，把手伸进她的裙子里，用手指穿过她。周四在佛罗里达州坦帕接受《光谱湾新闻9》采访时，拜登重申了他对里德说法的否认，称其为“彻头彻尾的谎言”。

“塔拉·里德什么也没发生。相信女人意味着当一个女人站出来的时候，认真对待她的要求，然后审查它，调查它...

这种情况也是如此。女性有发表意见的权利，媒体应该严格调查这类指控。我将永远坚持这个原则。

但最终在所有情况下，真相才是最重要的。在这种情况下，事实是这些说法完全是假的，假的。在上周msnbc的采访中，拜登断然否认了这一指控。

“我毫不含糊地说，这从未发生过。没有，从来没有发生过。

虽然拜登否认这一指控，但他也认为应该允许女性提出指控，并对其进行彻底审查。

“我不明白，但我不会进去质疑她的动机。我不会攻击她。拜登在上周的采访中说:“她有权说任何她想说的话，但我有权说,‘看看事实，核实一下，看看她所说的是否属实。’。

里德批评拜登的竞选团队周四对她的指控的回应，称鉴于前副总统的评论，他们的处理有“一定程度的虚伪”。

“这不安全。我所有的社交媒体都被黑了，我所有的个人信息都被篡改了。reade告诉kelly,“每个可能对我有不满的人——前男友或前房东，或者不管是什么，都可以有一个平台，而不是我,”但reade并没有在发布的视频中扩展或提供黑客攻击的证据。

拜登的竞选副经理kate bedingfield周四晚上也就reade的指控发表了一份新的声明，称女性应该能够分享她们的故事而不必担心她们的安全，但是质疑reade的说法中的“不一致”。

“每天都有越来越多的矛盾出现。女性必须接受怀疑。他们必须能够站出来分享他们的故事，而不用担心报复或伤害——我们都有责任确保这一点。同时，我们永远不能牺牲事实。

事实是，这些指控都是虚假的，而且在审查过程中，支持这些指控的材料不断证明它们是虚假的。当凯利问她是否想要前副总统道歉时，里德说她认为“有点晚了”。

拜登竞选团队没有立即回应abc新闻的置评请求。abc新闻采访了几个里德说她分享了她的故事的人，包括里德的兄弟，一个朋友，和她的前邻居，他们讲述了里德告诉他们的一个涉及拜登的事件。

里德的哥哥科林·莫尔顿最初告诉美国广播公司新闻，他只在今年春天听到过她对袭击的描述。但在3月下旬的首次采访后，莫尔顿当天晚些时候给美国广播公司发短信“澄清”他的叙述，说他记得1993年他妹妹告诉他，拜登“或多或少把她逼到了墙角”,并“把手放在”她的衣服上。

“虽然里德说她和办公室里的几个人谈过这件事，但拜登的多名前工作人员说，他们不记得里德曾经向他们提起过她的投诉。”当时拜登的幕僚长泰德·考夫曼告诉美国广播公司新闻，她没有来找我，如果她来了，我会记得，但我不记得她了。如果她带着这个来找我，我会记得她。里德还告诉美国广播公司新闻，她提出了一份书面投诉后，声称攻击拜登使她感到“不舒服”，但不包括指控性侵犯，她已经针对他，她没有保留投诉的副本。

拜登已经要求参议院秘书公布任何可能与里德指控相关的记录，但参议院秘书办公室上周表示，根据管理处理此类记录的法律，他们不得这样做。

​

根据abc新闻周四获得的一份声明，reade还聘请了wigdor llp律师事务所的法律代表。这家总部位于纽约的公司的创始合伙人道格拉斯·维格在2016年总统竞选期间支持唐纳德·特朗普总统，但在声明中，该公司反驳了他们对reade的代表是出于政治动机的说法，引用了维格多对各种民主党政治家的支持，以及他对女性的代表，这些女性提出了对前福克斯新闻主持人比尔·o’Reilly和名誉扫地的电影大亨哈维·温斯坦的性侵犯指控。

在该公司的声明中，他们指出wigdor支持纽约州的几位民主党政治家，包括国会议员hakeem jeffries、纽约司法部长laticia james、地方检察官eric gonzalez和纽约公共辩护律师jumaane williams。

“我们对里德女士的陈述与政治毫无关系。我们决定接手此事，因为每一个幸存者都有权获得合格的律师，这正是我们将提供的，”该公司周四发布的声明说。

 

Biden accuser says she wants Biden to drop out of the 2020 race for president

The woman who accused Joe Biden of assaulting her in a senate office buildingin 1993 offered her first public comments since the former vice president firmly denied her allegations last week, saying she wants Biden to drop out of the 2020 race for president.

“You and I were there, Joe Biden, please step forward and be held accountable. You should not be running on character for President of the United States,” Tara Reade said Thursday in a clip of an interview posted online with journalist Megyn Kelly.

“I wish he would, but he won't,” Reade said when asked if she wanted Biden to end his campaign. “I wish he would, that's how I feel emotionally.”

Reade’s allegations against Biden have emerged haltingly over the past several weeks, with heavy promotion from aides and relatives of President Trump. Thursday’s on-camera interview with Kelly marks the first time she has spoken on camera about the allegations since Biden’s denial last week.

Reade, 56, served as an entry-level Senate staff assistant in Biden’s office for a short period in 1993. She alleged in interviews with ABC News and other media outlets that Biden aides asked her to hand-deliver a gym bag to him in a Senate office building and when she did, she alleges he moved in close, pinned her against a wall, slipped his hand under her skirt and penetrated her with his fingers.

In an interview with Spectrum Bay News 9 in Tampa, Florida on Thursday, Biden reiterated his denial of Reade’s claim, calling it “flat out false.”

“Nothing ever happened with Tara Reade. Believing women means taking a woman’s claim seriously when she steps forward and then vetting it, looking into it...That’s true in this case too. Women have a right to be heard and the press should rigorously investigate claims like these. I’ll always uphold that principle. But in the end in every case the truth is what matters. And in this case, the truth is these claims are flat out false, false,” Biden said.

In an interview last week on MSNBC, Biden flatly denied the allegation.

"I'm saying unequivocally, it never, never happened. It didn't, it never happened," Biden said.

While Biden denied the allegation, he has also argued women should be allowed to come forward with allegations and have them thoroughly vetted.

“I don't understand it, but I'm not going to go in and question her motive. I'm not going to attack her. She has a right to say whatever she wants to say, but I have a right to say, ‘Look at the facts, check it out, find out whether any of what she says is asserted is true,’” Biden said in his interview last week.

Reade was critical of Biden’s campaign Thursday for their response to her allegation, saying there was a “measure of hypocrisy,” on their handling, given the former vice president’s comments.

“It's not been safe. All my social media has been hacked, all my personal information has been dragged through. Every person that maybe has a you know a gripe against me -- an ex-boyfriend or an ex-landlord, or whatever it is, has been able to have a platform rather than me,” Reade told Kelly, but did not expand or provide evidence of the hacking in the clip posted.

Biden’s deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield also issued a new statement Thursday evening on Reade’s allegation, saying that women should be able to share their stories without having to worry about their safety, but calling into question “inconsistencies” in Reade’s claims.

“Every day, more and more inconsistencies arise. Women must receive the benefit of the doubt. They must be able to come forward and share their stories without fear of retribution or harm - and we all have a responsibility to ensure that. At the same time, we can never sacrifice the truth. And the truth is that these allegations are false and that the material that has been presented to back them up, under scrutiny, keeps proving their falsity,” Bedingfield wrote.

When pressed by Kelly if she wanted an apology from the former vice president, Reade said she thought it was “a little late.”

The Biden campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment by ABC News.

ABC News spoke with several people Reade said she shared her story with, including Reade’s brother, a friend, and former neighbor of hers who recounted Reade telling them of an incident involving Biden.

Reade’s brother, Collin Moulton, initially told ABC News he only heard her account of the assault this spring. But after the initial interview in late March, Moulton texted ABC News later that day to “clarify” his account, saying he remembered his sister telling him in 1993 that Biden had “more or less cornered her against the wall” and ‘put his hands ‘up her clothes.’”

While Reade said she spoke with several people in the office about the incident, multiple former staffers to Biden say that they do not remember Reade ever bringing her complaint to them.

"She did not come to me, I would have remembered if she had, and I do not remember her," Ted Kaufman, Biden's chief of staff at the time told ABC News. "I would have well remembered her if she had come to me with this."

Reade also told ABC News that she filed a written complaint following the alleged assault that Biden made her feel "uncomfortable,” but did not include the allegation of sexual assault she has since leveled against him, and that she did not retain a copy of the complaint.

Biden has requested that the Secretary of the Senate release any records that may be relevant to Reade’s alleged complaint, but the secretary’s office said last week that they are prohibited from doing so under the law that governs the handling of such records.

Reade has also retained legal representation from the law firm Wigdor LLP, according to a statement obtained by ABC News on Thursday.

The New York-based firm’s founding partner, Douglas Wigor, supported President Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign, but in its statement the firm pushed back on claims that their representation of Reade is politically motivated, citing Wigdor’s support for various Democratic politicians and his representation of women who brought forth claims of sexual assault against former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly and disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein.

In the firm’s statement they point to Wigdor’s support of several Democratic politicians from the state of New York, including Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, New York Attorney General Laticia James, District Attorney Eric Gonzalez, and New York Public Advocate Jumaane Williams.

“Our representation of Ms. Reade has absolutely nothing to do with politics. We have decided to take this matter on because every survivor has the right to competent counsel, and that is exactly what we will provide,” the firm’s statement released Thursday said.