NBC host confronts Bill Clinton: Did you ever apologize to Monica Lewinsky?

NBC host Craig Melvin confronted former President Clinton, during an interview that aired Monday, over the scandal surrounding his affair with then-White House intern Monica Lewinsky while he was president.

Melvin, speaking with Clinton on “Today” about the relationship in the context of the “Me Too” movement, asked the former president if he ever apologized to Lewinsky.

“I apologized to everybody in the world,” Clinton said.

“But you didn’t apologize to her?” Melvin pressed.

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The former president said that he does not feel like he owes Lewinsky an apology and that he “never talked to her.”

“But I did say, publicly, on more than one occasion, that I was sorry. That’s very different. The apology was public,” Clinton said.

He also pushed back against the depiction of his relationship with Lewinsky, saying he didn’t think he would approach the accusations differently today and would not resign because he didn’t “think it would be an issue.”

“Because people would be using the facts instead of the imagined facts. If the facts were the same today, I wouldn’t,” Clinton said.

“So a lot of the facts have been conveniently omitted to make the story work. I think partly because they were frustrated that they got all these serious allegations against the current occupant of the Oval Office,” Clinton said of President Trump, who has faced numerous accusations of sexual misconduct.

“And his voters don’t seem to care … I think I did the right thing. I defended the Constitution.”

Clinton later asked Melvin if he thought President Kennedy or President Johnson should have resigned over allegations of inappropriate relationships.

“Someone should ask you these questions, because of the way you formulate the question,” Clinton said, noting that he left office $16 million in debt due to the scandal. “I dealt with it 20 years ago. And the American people, two-thirds of them, stayed with me. And I’ve tried to do a good job since them with my life and with my work. That’s all I have to say to you.”

Clinton last week similarly dismissed Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s (D-N.Y.) statement that he should have resigned after his relationship with Lewinsky went public, saying that her comment ignored the “context” of his decision to remain in office.

Clinton was impeached for perjury and for obstruction of justice for lying about his relationship with Lewinsky. He was acquitted by the Senate and was not removed from office.