Former President George H.W. Bush is facing a seventh accusation of sexual misconduct.
A 55-year-old woman, who spoke to CNN anonymously, said that the former president groped her during his 1992 re-election campaign — during his presidency.
“We got closer together for a family photo and it was like ‘Holy crap!’” she told the news organization, adding the then-president of the United States, grabbed her buttocks. “It was like a gentle squeeze.”
Unlike other more contemporary allegations which took place when the former president was wheelchair bound and in his nineties, the latest charge of sexual impropriety against Bush Sr. happened during a period when he would have been fully in command of his faculties.
In the past, the former president has responded to other groping allegations — and that he often preceded his actions with a joke about how his favorite magician was “David Cop-a-Feel — with references to his advanced age. Spokesman Jim McGrath specifically cited Bush’s age as a possible cause for the issue.
“At age 93, President Bush has been confined to a wheelchair for roughly five years, so his arm falls on the lower waist of people with whom he takes pictures,” Bush spokesman Jim McGrath told Deadspin regarding earlier allegations. “To try to put people at ease, the president routinely tells the same joke — and on occasion, he has patted women’s rears in what he intended to be a good-natured manner. Some have seen it as innocent; others clearly view it as inappropriate. To anyone he has offended, President Bush apologizes most sincerely.”
McGrath did not immediately respond to request for comment from TheWrap.