Donald Trump bragged about trying to have sex with a married woman and being able to grope women in previously unaired footage from 2005 that surfaced on Friday.
Trump is heard discussing women in vulgar terms during off-camera banter during the taping of a segment for “Access Hollywood,” footage which was obtained by The Washington Post.
During the lewd conversation captured by a microphone Trump was wearing on his lapel, Trump recounts how he tried to “f—” an unidentified married woman before bragging that he is “automatically attracted to beautiful (women)” and just starts “kissing them.” The conversation came just months after Trump married his third and current wife, Melania.
He also said: “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything … Grab them by the p—-. You can do anything.”
The jaw-dropping description of uninhibited sexual assault as a benefit of his celebrity poses a substantial setback to Trump’s attempts to overcome his deficit with female voters with just a month until Election Day. Hillary Clinton and her campaign have repeatedly sought to portray Trump as disrespectful and demeaning toward women, bringing up a slew of rude and vulgar comments Trump has made about women during and before his run for president.
The comments immediately raised the stakes for Sunday’s highly anticipated debate between Trump and Clinton, and the remarks could hand her — and viewers in the town hall audience — more evidence to make that point.
The remarks prompted Trump — for the first time in his nearly 16-month campaign — to apologize.
“This was locker room banter, a private conversation that took place many years ago. Bill Clinton has said far worse to me on the golf course – not even close. I apologize if anyone was offended,” Trump said in a statement released Friday.
Clinton’s campaign tweeted a link to the story and said simply, “This is horrific. We cannot allow this man to become president.”
“This is horrific. We cannot allow this man to become president,” Clinton tweeted.
Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine, campaigning in Las Vegas, said Trump’s comments “makes me sick to my stomach.”
“I don’t like to say the words that he’s used in the past when he calls women, ‘pigs, dogs and slobs’ … but this is behavior that’s just outrageous and so that there would be a news story that would have more statements like this of this kind, I mean, gosh, I’m sad to say that I’m not surprised,” Kaine said. “I should be surprised and shocked. I’m sad to say that I’m not.”
‘You can do anything’
The hot mic conversation captured in 2005 begins with Trump recounting to “Access Hollywood” host Billy Bush how he tried to have sex with a married woman.
“I moved on her and I failed. I’ll admit it,” Trump says in the newly-released audio. “I did try and f— her. She was married.”
“I moved on her like a b—-, but I couldn’t get there. And she was married,” Trump adds, after saying he took the woman — who is identified only by her first name — out furniture shopping.
“Then all of a sudden I see her, she’s now got the big phony t— and everything. She’s totally changed her look,” Trump says of the woman.
The conversation took place as Trump arrived in a tour bus on the set of “Days of Our Lives,” the soap opera where he was set to make a cameo appearance.
Before Trump stepped off the bus, he and Bush appear to see an actress from the soap opera who greets Trump and Bush.
“Whoa!” Trump says. “I’ve gotta use some tic tacs, just in case I start kissing her. You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait.”
“And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything … Grab them by the p—-. You can do anything,” Trump says.
“Whatever you want,” says another voice.
Republican reaction
Reactions from GOP staffers and advisers to Trump ranged from astonished to apoplectic.
A close adviser to Trump told CNN the story is “flat out appalling” and at this point, they can’t even begin to guess whether Trump can come back from this.
“This should have never happened. I wish it had never happened. I think I know that men talk this way sometimes, but it’s nothing I would ever want to hear or condone or approve of,” the adviser said. “My reaction is — it’s appalling. It’s just flat out appalling.”
The adviser also said Trump’s apology does not go far enough.
“Doing anything other than to say it was a grievous error and he apologizes would be a mistake,” the adviser said. “I would take it a step further and own to the words as being offensive — not ‘if.'”
The adviser, clearly exasperated, added: “Another day in Trump world … I hate it.”
Asked about the reaction at a campaign field office, a Trump field staffer told CNN there were “gasps. Collective gasps. We’re trying to get our heads around it right now, but there’s no way to spin this. There just isn’t.”
The staffer, who is also paying close attention to Senate efforts, also added, unsolicited: “Just think of the down-ballot effect. Brutal.”
A GOP operative in Ohio voiced similar sentiments.
“This is bad. I think this thing is over,” the staffer said.
Reached for comment, a top battleground state staffer told CNN he was “picking (his) chin off the floor.”
“We want every suburban woman’s vote in America. This doesn’t help with that,” the staffer said.
And a Trump campaign source said they were “dumbfounded,” saying the remarks “could be a death knell.”
The source had no predictions on how the article will impact the race, saying the next two days will be critical.
“I think the next 48 hours will be the most consequential of the entire election. Right here, right now, this is game time,” the source said.
One senior Trump adviser said simply, “Ugh.”
A stunning apology
The seriousness of Trump’s remarks could be gauged by his apology, the first time he has offered such a concession as a presidential candidate. He has offered “regret” on several occasions, notably in August when he acknowledged he sometimes says “the wrong thing” and in April when he said retweeting an unflattering picture of Ted Cruz’s wife, Heidi Cruz, was “a mistake.”
Previously, Trump has said that he would only apologize for something if he was “wrong.”
“I fully think apologizing is a great thing. But you have to be wrong,” Trump said in a September 2015 appearance on “The Tonight Show.”
And in a March CNN town hall, Trump could not recount the last time he had apologized for something but said that “if you’re not wrong, I don’t believe in apologizing.”
Pressed again on specific times when he’s apologized for anything in his life.
“Yes, I mean — apologized — I apologized to my mother years ago for using foul language,” Trump said. “I apologize to my wife for not being presidential on occasion.”