Last Wednesday, an extraordinary press conference was held in the shadow of the U.S. Capitol by victims of sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein.

Anyone who watched these women pour out their hearts to demand justice for themselves and other victims could not help but be moved.

Unfortunately, President Donald Trump did not watch, and then – almost simultaneously – dismissed the women’s heartfelt pleas for a public reckoning of Epstein’s abuse as “a Democrat hoax.”

No doubt, Trump is a rhetorical genius who has been able to define issues to his own benefit for years, but this was a low point in his presidency.

Much as it is understandable that Trump perceives the attention being given to Epstein’s life and mysterious death in a federal prison as a distraction, that must be weighed against the human toll that Epstein took. Calling it a hoax belittles the pain and suffering of women who were victims of, at worst, rape and, at best, sexual abuse.

And though Trump judged the women before he had even had a chance to hear them speak, they had already rejected his label:

“This is not a hoax. It’s not going to go away,” said Marina Lacerda, who was a witness in Epstein’s 2019 indictment that led to his imprisonment and death.

Abuse survivor Haley Robson, who introduced herself as a registered Republican, invited the president to meet her “in person so you can understand this is not a hoax. We are real human beings. This is real trauma.”

After the president made his dismissive remarks, Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called Trump to ask him to........

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