Interview With Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D) Massachusetts; Biden's Strong Denial.
KING: Former vice president Joe Biden says Tara Reade deserves to be heard but he also says her claim is false. Reade is a former senate staffer. Last year she accused then-senator Biden of touching her shoulders and her neck and making her feel uncomfortable. In recent weeks she has said it was more than that, accusing Biden 27 years ago back in 1993 of using his knee to spread her legs and then assaulting her with his fingers.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you sexually assault Tara Reade?</s>JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No. It is not true. I'm saying it unequivocally. It never, never happened. Women have a right to be heard and the press should rigorously investigate claims they make. I'll always uphold that principle. But in the end, in every case, the truth is what matters. And in this case the truth is the claims are false.</s>KING: Reade says she filed a complaint about uncomfortable interactions back at the time. Numerous former Biden aides contacted by CNN and other news organizations say they have no recollection of any complaint and say they were never told of or never heard of such an incident. Biden is now asking the Senate and the national archives to review available records, and if anything relevant is found, to release it. He's also facing calls to allow an independent search of his personal papers held by the University of Delaware to verify there are no relevant documents there. Those documents are meant to be kept private until two years after Biden retires from public life. Lisa Lerer of the "New York Times" is still with us. CNN's M.J. Lee joins the conversation. Lisa -- there was an anticipation that we would hear in a televised interview from Tara Reade this weekend but she decided to wait. You spoke to her about that.</s>LERER: I did. And what she told me was that she was getting numerous death threats. Not only she but her child was also getting death threats. They were getting all kind of things coming in on the Internet. They had to alert the police and that spooked her and made her, she said, want to not do this interview and kind of keep a lower profile, as much as that's possible, really, at this stage in this whole situation.</s>KING: Right. And anybody watching, whatever you think of the allegations, whatever you think of Tara Reade, whatever you think of Joe Biden, that is reprehensible. It is just reprehensible that it would come to that in this environment. M.J. -- one of the things -- one of the political dynamics to this story is that you have some of the veterans of the Obama search process, the attorney who led the vetting back in 2008 that led Barack Obama to pick Joe Biden, other members of the staff including the top strategist David Axelrod writing on CNN.com. "The comprehensive vet certainly would have turned up any formal complaints filed against Biden during his 36-year career in the senate. It did not. The team would have investigated any salacious rumors of this sort that travel far and wide in Washington. There were none. Had any credible issue been raised, you can be sure Biden would not have been the nominee. Obama would not have tolerated it." You see here, and I'm not criticizing it, but this is a concerted effort by Team Obama to say, we looked under every rock, there was nothing there.</s>M.J. LEE, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, and this is just one of the really tricky things about reporting out this story, you know, people who say they know Joe Biden really well and have known him for decades, those folks have said, and we've spoken to some half dozen former Biden aides. I know Lisa has done really extensive reporting on this as well. They say that the Joe Biden that they knew at the time simply did not have this kind of reputation. They also just heard nothing at the time about any complaints about sexual harassment let alone a complaint about sexual assault. So on the one hand you have folks who knew Biden, which includes more recently the people who would have been involved in doing his vetting in the run-up to the Obama presidency. And then you of course have the people who are close to Tara Reade who have come forward to say she told us about this alleged sexual assault either at the time or within a few years of it happening. So at some point, not only is this becoming sort of a he said/she said, but it's also becoming a her people said and his people said. And I think that's why this has become obviously so divisive and I think so personally hurtful to people who feel like they know these two people who are saying very different things.</s>KING: Right. And so it's a difficult moment for all involved. And Lisa -- you did some reporting in the newspaper today on what this does to liberal activists, to members of the Democratic Party who have been advocates for the MeToo Movement who are just some of the people under consideration for Joe Biden's running mate list in here back when Brett Kavanaugh was the nominee before the Supreme Court. They were pretty clear about the deference that should be given to any woman who has something to say.</s>SENATOR KAMALA HARRIS (D), CALIFORNIA: -- believe her. She has the courage to come forward. She has nothing to gain.</s>SENATOR AMY KLOBUCHAR (D), MINNESOTA: When you look at the rules of evidence, when you look at credibility, the fact that she had mentioned this years before means a lot.</s>STACEY ABRAMS (D), FORMER GEORGIA GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I was proud of Dr. Blasey Ford's response and her demeanor but more importantly, her courage in stepping forward.</s>KING: Discuss sort of the anxiety among Democrats, many of whom, including those women right there, who say I believe Joe Biden but their own public record says Tara Reade deserves to be heard.</s>LERER: Right. Democrats are put in a really challenging position as a result of all this. Democrats have really staked their reputational brand during the Trump Era in part to draw contrast with the President, who of course, has more than a dozen women accusing him of sexual abuse in various forms as being the party that takes a no- tolerance stance when it comes to sexual harassment, you know, gender bias, sexual violence -- all these kinds of issues.</s>LERER: And so now they're faced with what is by all accounts a very challenging case. Some Democrats are drawing a distinction from Kavanaugh, saying unlike in Kavanaugh, where there was a body, the Senate, to investigate those claims, there's no real clear body here to investigate these claims. Joe Biden is not in office. This is a presidential campaign. There is no employer or ethics committee or anything like that. So that leaves everybody kind of in this murky territory -- voters and, you know, partisans on both sides, of how to figure out what is actually going on here. I also think some of this is due to the campaign's response because Biden and his campaign were silent for so many weeks, that really put his top female surrogates, including some who are being considered for the vice presidency in this position where they had to answer challenging questions that he was unwilling to go out there and talk about. And that's a position that no politician particularly wants to be in -- particularly, you know, when you think you're auditioning for the vice president presidential slot. This was just a number challenging political dynamics both from the campaign and really from the sort of larger political environment and moment that we're in.</s>KING: Lisa Lerer, M.J. lee -- I appreciate your insights on this. I just want to echo the point and people at home should make up their own decision as this story plays out but the idea that the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee are trying to traffic in this story is laughable given the President's own history and his lack of transparency on this issue. That's it for us this Sunday. Hope you can catch us weekdays as well. We're here at noon Eastern. Up next, a very busy "STATE OF THE UNION" with Jake Tapper. Don't go anywhere. Jake's guests include the White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow, the Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, plus Independent Congressman Justin Amash who hopes to be the Libertarian Party's presidential nominee. Thanks again for sharing your Sunday. Have a good day. Stay safe.