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Trump’s ‘I understand college’ defense of Kavanaugh makes no sense

"I understand college very well," President Trump said in defense of his Supreme Court pick.

 

Ellen Ioanes

Tech

Posted on Sep 25, 2018   Updated on May 21, 2021, 5:39 am CDT

In defending Brett Kavanaugh against new allegations of sexual assault, President Donald Trump has made it clear that he understands some things. He understands how people report sexual assault. He understands how drinking works. But what he really understands is college.

In dismissing the claims of Deborah Ramirez, Kavanaugh’s latest accuser, Trump said of Kavanaugh, “You know, when he said that really, what he was focused on was trying to be number one in his class at Yale, to me, that was so believable,” Trump said. “I understand college very well. I understand being No. 1 in your class, and I understand a lot of things.”

Kavanaugh’s defense has mainly been predicated on his image as a virginal, focused, hardworking young man, even as contemporaneous evidence suggests otherwise. In an interview with Fox News on Tuesday, Kavanaugh claimed that he was a virgin in high school and “for many years thereafter,” a statement which may be true, but is irrelevant to the claims leveled against him.

It could be just another instance of Trump saying something inane, but in this case, Trump apparently made the statement to suggest that Kavanaugh was so busy trying to be number one in his class that he couldn’t possibly have time to sexually harass a woman. But plenty of smart, hardworking, and successful people sexually assault women, as we’ve seen over the past year.

Trump has also claimed that he graduated first in his class at Wharton, but no evidence supports this.

Twitter had fun with the statement, though:

https://twitter.com/JoshuaSGoodman/status/1044664126792962060

https://twitter.com/jenngulbrandsen/status/1044622351395098624

His own university, which was the focus of a lawsuit Trump was forced to settle, also shows he doesn’t understand it.

Trump made the statement while speaking at the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, then suggested that the accusations are part of a “con” by Democrats to keep his nominee off the Supreme Court.

“It’s horrible what the Democrats have done. It’s a con game they’re playing,” he said. “They’re really con artists. They’re trying to convince—you know, they don’t believe it themselves, okay? They know he’s a high-quality person. They don’t believe it.”

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*First Published: Sep 25, 2018, 4:27 pm CDT