President Trump Donald John TrumpSteele Dossier sub-source was subject of FBI counterintelligence probe Pelosi slams Trump executive order on pre-existing conditions: It 'isn't worth the paper it's signed on' Trump 'no longer angry' at Romney because of Supreme Court stance MORE on Thursday watched part of Christine Blasey Ford's dramatic testimony about her sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters that Trump tuned in to the testimony, with a bit of a delay, aboard Air Force One in New York during a brief flight back to Washington.

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Trump boarded the plane during opening statements from Ford and the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Televisions inside the presidential aircraft were tuned to Fox News's live coverage of the hearing, according to reporters on the plane.

Sanders said Trump did not speak to Kavanaugh on Thursday before the hearing. Trump was returning to the nation's capital after spending the week in New York for the United Nations General Assembly.

The president did not respond to shouted questions about the hearing after disembarking Air Force One.

Trump's public schedule is clear the rest of the afternoon, when he is expected to watch the testimony of Ford and Kavanaugh at the White House.

Trump has forcefully defended the judge, saying at a news conference on Wednesday that he believes the allegations are "all false" and part of "a big, fat con job" by Democrats to prevent him from putting a conservative judge on the Supreme Court.

But the president also opened the door to withdrawing Kavanaugh's nomination if he believed Ford's allegations.

"I’m going to see what’s said. It’s possible that they will be convincing," Trump told reporters in New York.

Asked if he would pull back Kavanaugh from consideration, Trump responded, "If I thought he was guilty of something like this, yeah sure."

Trump is known to respond to media coverage of events surrounding his administration, and Fox News personalities said during coverage of the hearing they found Ford's allegations credible.

"This is a disaster for the Republicans," said anchor Chris Wallace, who added he believed the testimony from Ford "was extremely emotional, extremely raw and extremely credible."

Fox's Brit Hume called Ford a "very sympathetic witness."