Nobody cared about the beating accusations because
nobody cared about the beating accusations. For a certain kind of man (this is somewhat a generational "code of honor", but not just), it's ok to do anything you want to women, it's just not ok to get caught doing it. You know, cheat on your wife, but don't let her know about it, and certainly don't let her know about it in a way she can't pretend she doesn't know by having it become public. Do what you want, but just don't be dumb enough to get caught. The assault isn't the problem, the pictures are. And throw in Trump's narcissism, and the real problem is that it makes
Trump look bad.
The president, for his part, was deeply displeased with how his staff had handled this latest self-inflicted crisis. According to two sources with direct knowledge, Trump began commenting in the West Wing about how awful press coverage had been of the Porter scandal and “how terrible” it looked that the White House was forced to back down and—in a jarringly uncharacteristic move from Trump-world—ultimately cop to a grave error.
No one there cared, they just didn't want it to make them look bad. That's Porter's "crime" (and now Kelly and
Hicks).
