Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, the father and mother in the family featured in the TLC reality show 19 Kids and Counting, said on their website on Saturday they will soon appear in a Fox News interview, in which they will address allegations that one of their sons molested girls when he was younger.

The scheduling of the interview, which the Duggars said would center on the time period when their eldest son is suspected of committing the wrongdoing, follows a decision by at least a dozen advertisers to ditch 19 Kids and Counting.

The Duggars’ show features their large Christian family and is one of the top programmes on cable TV.

The scandal was touched off when In Touch magazine published a police report alleging Josh Duggar fondled several girls when he was a teenager. Last week he acknowledged acting “inexcusably” 12 years ago and apologized for his actions.

Josh Duggar was never charged and the police report was destroyed last week by court order, to protect the identity of an alleged victim.

“Next week we will sit down with Megyn Kelly on Fox News to share our hearts with you about the pain that we walked through as a family 12 years ago, the tears we all shed and the forgiveness that was given,” Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar said in a statement on their website.

On Thursday, Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum said he was “sickened” by revelations of molestation by Josh Duggar, who formerly worked at Christian lobbying group the Family Research Council and had once helped Santorum campaign.

Another Republican 2016 candidate, Mike Huckabee, has defended the family. In a statement, he said: “Those who have enjoyed revealing this long ago sins [sic] in order to discredit the Duggar family have actually revealed their own insensitive bloodthirst, for there was no consideration of the fact that the victims wanted this to be left in the past and ultimately a judge had the information on file destroyed – not to protect Josh, but the innocent victims.”

Media commentators have speculated that Discovery, which owns TLC, could end production of 19 Kids and Counting over the scandal.

