Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar gave their first interview on Wednesday about their son Josh Duggar’s molestation confession, telling Fox News’s Megyn Kelly how they discovered what he had done and what they did afterwards. ICYMI: The oldest child of the famous 19 Kids & Counting clan admitted to and apologized for fondling the genitals and breasts of the girls, including two of his sisters.
The Duggars said Josh initially came to them and confessed when he was 14, but he continued touching girls several more times.
“There was so much grief in our hearts,” Michelle said. “I think as parents we felt, ‘Ugh, we’re failures.’ [We] tried to raise our kids to do what’s right, to know what’s right, and, yeah, one of our children [made] some really bad choices, and I think as a parent, we were just, we were devastated.”
“He said he was just curious about girls and he had gone in and just basically touched them over their clothes while they were sleeping,” Jim Bob said. “They didn’t even know he had done it.”
“We thought, at first, that Josh was on the road to mend,” he said. “But he was still a kid, he was still a juvenile. He wasn’t an adult. So there were a couple more times where he came and told us what he’d done, and we were just devastated.”
“Again, this was not rape,” Jim Bob said. “This was touching people over their clothes. There were some instances touching under the clothes, but it was a few seconds.”
Michelle said her daughters didn’t understand what was happening was “improper touch.” The couple said they tried to put up “boundaries” and safeguards to protect their young daughters.
After Josh came to them several times, Jim Bob and Michelle finally sent him out of the home, to a friend who ran a Christian camp. At the camp, Jim Bob said Josh “broke” and “God came into his life.”
Then, when he came back, Jim Bob and Michelle said they decided to take him to law enforcement, which they did because it was “an important step for Josh to confess to the police what he had done, because he had broken the law.”
Watch part of the interview below.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Gpo6dRo7No&w=640&h=360]
The Duggars said they may sue the person who released the information to In Touch, the magazine that broke the story. Michelle said her children were “victimized” by people with their own agenda after the story broke.
On Friday, Fox will air another portion of Megyn Kelly’s interview with the Duggars, featuring her conversation with sisters Jessa and Jill, identified as two of Josh’s victims.
