Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Would Bill Clinton Have Apologized To Monica Lewinsky In The #MeToo Era?

With the rise of the #MeToo movement, former President Bill Clinton has received criticism for his affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinksy— but Clinton still defends his actions, NBC News reported.

Asked if he ever considered privately apologizing to Lewinsky, Clinton told NBC, “No, I do not — I have 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.”

“This was litigated 20 years ago. Two-thirds of the American people sided with me,” Clinton added of the affair.

Clinton told NBC News that he still stands by his decision to fight his impeachment rather than resign. “I think I did the right thing. I defended the Constitution,” he said.

The former president also spoke of President Donald Trump, who has faced allegations of sexual misconduct, saying he had not received the kind of media chaos Clinton himself had faced when the Lewinsky scandal came to light in 1998.

Lewinsky, 44, has re-emerged as an anti-bullying advocate in recent years, writing about how the current #MeToo movement has emboldened a new generation of women to come forward with their own sexual misconduct incidents.

Contact Haley Cohen at [email protected]

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.