Obama on Cosby: 'Any Civilized Country Should Have No Tolerance for Rape'

At a press conference otherwise focused on the Iran nuclear deal this afternoon, President Obama fielded a question about Bill Cosby.

Obama was asked if he would revoke the Medal of Freedom, which the comedian received in 2002, after dozens of women have accused Cosby of rape over the years.

“There is no precedent for revoking a medal. We don’t have that mechanism. And as you know, I tend to make it a policy not to comment on the specifics of — of cases where there might still be, if not criminal, then civil issues involved,” Obama said.

“I’ll say this. If you give a woman, or a man, for that matter, without his or her knowledge, a drug and then have sex with that person without consent, that’s rape, and I think this country, any civilized country, should have no tolerance for rape.”

Obama also brought up rape in his address to the NAACP last night, in the context of criminal justice reform.

“We should not be tolerating rape in prison. And we shouldn’t be making jokes about it in our popular culture,” he said. “That’s no joke. These things are unacceptable.”