Will Anita Hill hearing, 1994 crime bill come back to haunt Joe Biden in 2020?
Independent voter and former Bernie Sanders staffer Tez Figaro expects major scrutiny over the presidential hopeful's record in Congress during the campaign.
Former Vice President Joe Biden praised professor Anita Hill on Friday, suggesting she helped spur the #MeToo movement and important legislation by participating in contentious hearings over her accusations that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas engaged in sexual misconduct.
"She's one of the reasons why we have the #MeToo movement, she's one of the reasons why I was able to finish writing the Violence Against Women Act, she's one of the reasons why I committed ... there'd never be a Judiciary Committee I was on that didn't have women on it," he said.
Biden said Hill was "responsible for significant changes and she deserves credit for it." Amid Biden's announcement that he would run for president in 2020, he faced scrutiny over whether or not he should apologize to Hill, who faced questioning during his time on the Judiciary Committee nearly three decades ago.
While Biden apologized for the treatment Hill received, he defended his own conduct. "If you go back and look at what I said and didn't say, I don't think I treated her badly," he told co-host Joy Behar who suggested Hill wanted a more direct apology from Biden.
Biden had a private conversation during which he expressed his regret for treatment Hill received, but she reportedly wasn't satisfied with his comments.
“I cannot be satisfied by simply saying I’m sorry for what happened to you," she told The New York Times. "I will be satisfied when I know there is real change and real accountability and real purpose."
"He needs to give an apology to the other women and to the American public because we know now how deeply disappointed Americans around the country were about what they saw," Hill also said.
Biden, while appearing on "The View," said he didn't reach out to Hill earlier because he didn't want to "invade her space" after publicly apologizing for the treatment she received.
In the interview, Biden also criticized President Trump.
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Asked about the comment in his announcement that a battle is underway for “the soul of this nation,” Biden replied: “What I mean by that is we are not -- this is not who we are the way we're treating people. It's not who we are as a nation when we're talking about things like the reason for your problem is the other.
“It really is what I said and I really mean it and I wrote an article at the time in "The Atlantic" magazine when Charlottesville happened. This is not who we are. It's about decency, honor, including everyone. The idea to compare these racists and not condemn them. Neo-Nazis -- I don't ever remember that happening in an administration in well over 100 years.
“I found myself thinking -- by the way I travel around the world a lot as vice president and since then I have as well. The rest of the world -- I mean, they look at us like my god -- what happened to America?”
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