Trump administration's domestic violence scandal resonates for abused ex of Reagan official

Jayne O'Donnell | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Rob Porter's ex-wives detail alleged abuse and rage White House staff secretary Rob Porter, part of President Trump's inner circle, resigned from his position after accusations of abuse from his ex-wives.

The domestic violence news out of the White House this month was all too familiar to Charlotte Fedders.

Thirty-three years ago, she was the administration official's wife accusing her prominent spouse of serial abuse. Her then-husband, John Fedders, was the tall, handsome lawyer with a very different public image than the one his family saw at home. Like Jennifer Willoughby, ex-wife of President Trump's former staff secretary Rob Porter, Charlotte Fedders says she, too, was regularly called the same abusive name "to the point where it didn't mean too much anymore."

Fedders' 1987 bestselling book, Shattered Dreams, became a TV movie starring Lindsay Wagner.

"It has just brought too many memories with all the similarities," Fedders says, citing her own black eyes and broken window. "It’s been hard."

Back then, Fedders said, no one talked about this kind of abuse in the upper-middle-class, country-club world she then inhabited. So she stayed for 17 years after her 1966 wedding through the belittling, the physical abuse — including during her first pregnancy — and the weeks of silent treatment she and their children often got.

Fedders says she thought things had changed.

"I thought we had put a lot of this stuff behind us, us as a country," says Fedders, 74. "And it's very disturbing to know that someone would be in the White House that close to the president without a full security clearance with this past that people knew about."

One prominent difference between Fedders and the Porter story: She says she "never said a thing" about the abuse when administration officials were vetting her ex-husband to be the chief of enforcement at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

"I was afraid I’d be in real trouble if he found out," Fedders says.

Why women tolerate abuse

Women in prominent, affluent families may tolerate physical and emotional abuse because of fears that disclosure could harm families' reputations and careers, pediatrician Nadine Burke Harris writes in her new book The Deepest Well, which examines the health effects of these experiences on children.

When more affluent people don't talk about domestic violence, the problem continues, and it perpetuates the idea that "adversity is a problem for only certain communities," wrote Harris, who heads the Center for Youth Wellness in San Francisco.

Domestic abuse survivor and advocate L.Y. Marlow grew up in Philadelphia housing projects but knew stigma about abuse is spread across socioeconomic, racial and ethnic groups. A decade ago, she launched the advocacy group Saving Promise, named after her granddaughter, Promise, who Marlow wanted to prevent from becoming the fifth generation of women in her family to become domestic abuse victims.

"Unfortunately, sometimes it takes high-visibility people and circumstances for something to become part of the national agenda," says Marlow, whose group is working with the Harvard school of public health on domestic violence prevention. "The 'Me Too' and 'Time's Up' movements didn't get elevated until celebrities said something, even though the other stories are no less important."

When Fedders recently read a blog post Willoughby wrote last April, titled "Why I Stayed," it was like she could have written parts about her own former life.

"Everyone loved him," Willoughby wrote. "People commented all the time how lucky I was."

People used to say that about Fedders' 6-foot-10 ex-husband, too, including that "He just must be so wonderful to live with as he's extremely charming and smart," she says. After The Wall Street Journal wrote a story detailing the abuse and possible financial improprieties revealed in her divorce proceedings, Fedder says, "I think he was very surprised that the rest of the country didn’t still feel that way."

Fedders, 74, now lives in northern Virginia, where she still gets the same $400 a month in alimony, which is supplemented by Social Security and a small inheritance. She retired from her job as a nurse in 2016. Her ex-husband tried unsuccessfully to get a 25% share of the book profits. Charlotte Fedders used the money to help pay for their five sons' college education, to which John Fedders did not contribute.

More:

FBI and White House have conflicting timelines on Rob Porter background check

Trump says he's 'totally opposed' to domestic violence as House launches Porter investigation

Second White House official resigns amid domestic violence accusations

"I don’t have a whole lot of money or too many of the things I used to have, but my life is great now," says Fedders, who sees her 10 grandchildren regularly.

John Fedders could not be reached for comment.

Only one of the now-grown children has any contact with their father, Fedders says. Visitation stopped 28 years ago after Andrew, then 12, told his father, "Take me home. Violence is not the answer," after he was shoved against a wall for misbehaving in an elevator.

That's just as well, she said.

"They are all wonderful men who treat their wives like princesses," Fedders says. "They never raise their hands or their voices."

When he reposted a video of the Facebook Live Fedders did with USA TODAY last week, her oldest son, Luke, commented, "You CAN be a man from an abused household and NOT continue the violence. Five of us can attest to that, thanks to how we were raised by a strong woman/mother."