Duggars Tell Fox News Family Abuse Was "Not Rape Or Anything Like That," Call Transphobia "Common Sense"
Last night Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, stars of TLC's 19 Kids and Counting, spoke to Fox News' Megyn Kelly about allegations their son Josh sexually assaulted several girls when he was a teenager, including two of their daughters.
“This was not rape or anything like that, this was touching somebody over their clothes,” Jim Bob said. The couple also claim they sent Josh for treatment at an "alternative rehabilitation" program, though sources have reported it was simply a family friend in Little Rock with a home repair business.
Jim Bob and Michelle also identified their daughters Jessa, 22, and Jill, 24, as two of Josh’s victims.
“He said he was just curious about girls, and he had gone in and basically just touched them over their clothes while they were sleeping," said Jim Bob.
Michelle repeatedly insisted Josh's sisters were too young to understand what their brother was doing.
“One by one, as we talked with them, none of them were aware of Josh's wrong doings,” she said. “It was more his heart, his intent. He knew that it was wrong. But they weren't even aware... They didn't probably even understand that it was an improper touch."
No mention was made of any professional therapist being consulted about treating Josh or working with his victims. At first, Ma and Pa Duggar explained, they simply kept an eye on Josh.
But after two more incidents of inappropriate touching, "we felt we had to get help."
“As parents we were trying to do the best thing we knew how,” Michelle said. Jim Bob agreed, "Looking back, we did the best we could under the circumstances."
Surprisingly for a Fox News personality, Kelly did press the Duggars on some nagging issues—like why i they would launch a TV show shining a spotlight on a family that had gone through such a trauma, just four or five years after the incidents took place.
"We had nothing to hide," said Jim Bob. "We’d taken care of all that years before.”
The Duggars insist the outrage over the allegations is greater because they present themselves as Christians.
“I think, you know what, Christianity is not about being perfect or about being a perfect family, but it’s actually about being forgiven," said Jim Bob. "People on the outside think, ‘well Christians are supposed to be perfect…’ No, you know what, all of us as Christians we struggle every day.”
Kelly also asked Michelle about recording a transphobic robocall that "warned" parents their daughters would be molested in women's rest rooms by men in dresses if a local pro-LGBT ordinance passed.
"I think protecting young girls and not allowing young men and men in general to go into a girls' locker room is just common sense," replied the reality star and baby machine.
