A top executive at the Trump Organization said Tuesday that Donald Trump was “protecting a friend” when he previously defended former President Bill Clinton amid controversies surrounding Mr. Clinton’s past sexual indiscretions.
“He was a private citizen who was friendly with the Clintons and he was trying to protect a friend, all right?” Michael Cohen, executive vice president at the Trump Organization and special counsel to Mr. Trump, said on CNN’s “New Day.” “Now, it’s a different game. It’s 2016. He is the Republican presidential nominee.”
Mr. Trump has repeatedly attacked Mr. Clinton during the campaign over his past sex scandals and has called likely Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton an “enabler” of her husband’s behavior.
But in 2008, Mr. Trump had dismissed the impeachment proceedings against Mr. Clinton that stemmed from the former president’s response to his relationship with Monica Lewinsky.
“I mean, look at the trouble Bill Clinton got into with something that was totally unimportant and they tried to impeach him, which was nonsense,” Mr. Trump told CNN then.
“He’s not lying — he was protecting a friend,” Mr. Cohen said Tuesday. “There’s a difference.”
Mr. Cohen said that now, Mr. Trump is getting attacked on a daily basis.
“Let’s talk about 2016,” Mr. Cohen said. “We’re not going to talk about 1990, when he was defending Bill Clinton, [because] it didn’t matter.
“He was a private individual,” Mr. Cohen said of Mr. Trump. “He had no obligation to say anything to anybody. … He was standing up for a man who he considered to be a friend at the time.”
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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