st. louis<u+2014> donald trump followed through on his threats to bring bill clinton <u+2019>s sexual history to the presidential debate stage and to bring his accusers into the debate hall. he lashed out at the former president after being questioned over a 2005 recording, which surfaced friday, in which the republican presidential nominee is heard speaking in vulgar terms about making sexually aggressive moves toward women. he said mr. clinton <u+2019>s actions were worse than his words. <u+201c>no one in the history of this nation has been as abusive to women,<u+201d> he said. <u+201c>bill clinton was abusive to women. hillary clinton attacked those same women.<u+201d> he then ticked through consequences mr. clinton suffered: being impeached, losing his law license and paying a legal settlement. over the years, mrs. clinton has mostly avoided responding to claims about her husband, and at the debate, mrs. clinton declined to engage in the details of those decades-old charges. a spokesman for mr. clinton had no comment earlier sunday. <u+201c>so much of what he<u+2019>s just said is not right, but he gets to run his campaign any way he chooses,<u+201d> mrs. clinton said at the debate. <u+201c>when i hear something like that, i am reminded of what my friend, michelle obama, advised us all: <u+2018>when they go low, you go high.<u+2019> <u+201d> ahead of the debate, mr. trump held a media event with women who had accused the former president of sexual misconduct, and he then sat paula jones, juanita broaddrick and kathleen willey in the audience. <u+201c>actions speak louder than words,<u+201d> said ms. broaddrick who claimed mr. clinton raped her in 1978. <u+201c>mr. trump may have said some bad words, but bill clinton raped me and hillary clinton threatened me.<u+201d> the former president has denied the broaddrick accusations, and he wasn<u+2019>t charged with a crime. capital journal is wsj.com<u+2019>s home for election 2016 news. the group in st. louis also included kathy shelton, who criticized mrs. clinton for defending a man charged with raping her when she was 12 years old. mrs. clinton was helping lead a legal aid clinic at the university of arkansas at the time. clinton communications director jennifer palmieri called the event an <u+201c>act of desperation.<u+201d> <u+201c>we<u+2019>re not surprised to see donald trump continue his destructive race to the bottom,<u+201d> ms. palmieri said. <u+201c>hillary clinton understands the opportunity in this town hall is to talk to voters on stage and in the audience about the issues that matter to them, and this stunt doesn<u+2019>t change that.<u+201d> mrs. clinton has mostly avoided responding to claims about her husband. early sunday, mr. clinton<u+2019>s sexual past was put into the spotlight with a new video featuring ms. broaddrick, who volunteered on his 1978 campaign for arkansas governor. she repeated her allegations that mr. clinton raped her nearly four decades ago. ms. broaddrick previously made conflicting statements regarding the encounter. in 1997, she made sworn statements denying the alleged rape in a harassment lawsuit against the then-president by ms. jones, a former state employee. in 1998, she repudiated those statements and said mr. clinton had raped her. ms. broaddrick renewed the allegations in an interview posted sunday by the conservative website breitbart.com, which mr. trump on sunday morning linked to in a tweet. <u+201c>i kept telling him, <u+2018>no, i don<u+2019>t want this at all,<u+2019> and i<u+2019>m sure i must have said, <u+2018>you must have had the wrong idea.<u+2019> and he wouldn<u+2019>t listen, you know there was no way he would listen to what i was saying,<u+201d> she says in the new video, recounting the alleged incident, said to have taken place in a little rock, ark., hotel in 1978. <u+201c>he tore the waist of my skirt, and then he ripped my pantyhose and he raped me. it was very vicious. i was just pinned down and it was a very helpless situation. i didn<u+2019>t know what to do.<u+201d> ms. broaddrick asserts that mrs. clinton implied to her later that year at a campaign event that she knew of the hotel incident. ms. broaddrick says she interpreted mrs. clinton<u+2019>s thanks for her volunteer work as a signal to conceal their encounter. <u+201c>i felt like she knew<u+2026>and she was telling me to keep quiet,<u+201d> ms. broaddrick says in the video. that allegation surfaced only after mrs. clinton launched her campaign for the u.s. senate in 2000. a spokesman for mr. clinton had no comment. ms. willey, a former white house aide, accused mr. clinton of groping her in his office in 1993, though she had earlier given a deposition saying she had no memory of such an incident. mr. clinton denied the charge, and an independent prosecutor concluded there was insufficient evidence to charge him. ms. jones sued mr. clinton for sexual harassment in 1994, alleging that while he was governor he exposed himself to her in a little rock hotel. it was settled in 1998 for $850,000, without any admission of wrongdoing by mr. clinton. the case led to a significant blemish on the presidency, however, triggering investigations that through a convoluted path led eventually to a house impeachment of mr. clinton for lying to investigators. the senate acquitted mr. clinton of perjury and obstruction of justice charges in 1999. in january 1992, the clintons granted a joint interview to <u+201c>60 minutes<u+201d> to respond to claims by gennifer flowers, a former television reporter and cabaret singer, that she had an affair with the arkansas politician in the 1970s and 1980s. <u+201c>when this woman first got caught up in these charges, i felt, as i<u+2019>ve felt about all of these women, that they<u+2019>ve just been minding their own business and they got hit by a meteor,<u+201d> mrs. clinton said in the <u+201c>60 minutes<u+201d> interview, apparently referring to media inquiries about her husband<u+2019>s sexual history. <u+201c>i felt terrible about what was happening to them,<u+201d> mrs. clinton said. in a private conversation with a close friend, mrs. clinton referred to monica lewinsky, the white house intern who had an affair with mr. clinton, as a <u+201c>narcissistic<u+00a0>loony<u+00a0>toon,<u+201d> according to a diary kept by the friend, diane blair, that was included in her public papers after her death. last fall, mrs. clinton said on twitter that every sexual assault survivor had <u+201c>the right to be believed.<u+201d> after that, she was asked at a new hampshire town-hall event whether several women who have leveled charges against her husband, including ms. broaddrick, should be believed.<u+00a0><u+201c>well, i would say that everybody should be believed at first until they are disbelieved based on evidence,<u+201d> she replied. ms. broaddrick told buzzfeed news that she was so upset after those comments that she decided to air her charges anew. write to laura meckler at laura.meckler@wsj.com and jess bravin at jess.bravin@wsj.com
donald trump tries to turn focus to bill clinton    - wsj
laura meckler jess bravin