Rudy Giuliani on Trump scandal: ‘Talk and action are 2 different things’
Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a leading Donald Trump surrogate, on Sunday downplayed the GOP nominee’s 2005 comments that are now engulfing the presidential race.
“It was 10 or 12 years ago. He wasn’t at that time, you know, running for office, he wasn’t thinking of office,” Giuliani said on “Meet the Press,” according to an NBC transcript.
“He understands the responsibility is on his shoulders now, which wasn’t there back then,” he added.
Giuliani was among the inner circle of advisers who have been with Trump over the last 24 hours, which have been the most difficult moments yet of the celebrity businessman’s campaign. The former mayor said he was with Trump “all day” Saturday.
A slew of Republican governors, senators and House members have called for Trump to exit the race since Friday afternoon, when the Washington Post published audio of Trump crassly bragging about groping and trying to have sex with women, saying that, as a celebrity, “they let you do it. You can do anything.”
Trump apologized in a video published Saturday morning, but vowed to remain in the race.
Two top Trump surrogates — Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway and RNC Chairman Reince Priebus — pulled out of “Meet the Press,” and Giuliani appeared in their stead
“Are you the only one in the campaign that was willing to publicly defend him?” host Chuck Todd asked Giuliani.
During the interview, Giuliani insisted that Trump was not pulling out of the race. “He was selected by more Republican voters than anyone has ever been selected in a Republican primary. He owes them the duty to run,” he said.
He repeated that assurance later Sunday morning in a second round of questions with George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “This Week.”
To Todd, Giuliani said Trump “feels terrible” for having made the comments, which were made several months after his 2005 wedding to Melania Trump.
“When he was confronted with it, he was pretty darn shocked that he had said such terrible things, and he feels terrible about it. He feels terrible for his family and how embarrassing it is for them. He feels terrible from his own point of view. But he also realizes he has a responsibility,” he said.
Giuliani further suggested that Trump may have been exaggerating when he bragged about groping and kissing women without waiting for their approval.
“Well, the actions would be even worse if they were actions. Talk and action are two different things,” he told Todd.
Todd pointed to a recent New York Times interview with Temple Taggart, a former Miss Utah who said Trump inappropriately kissed her. Todd asked Giuliani if he was implying that Taggart was making up her claim of sexual harassment.
Giuliani pivoted back to the 2005 audio.
“I’m not implying it was made up. I said we’re talking about things that he was talking about. I don’t know how much he was exaggerating,” he said. “But I do know that this is unfortunately the kind of talk that goes on among a lot of people, and they shouldn’t talk about this. This is wrong.”
He added: “He’s running for president, he realizes that he’s got the weight and the responsibility of all these people on his shoulder, and this is something he’s not going to do in the future.”
