Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” while discussing the current presidential election back and forth about the candidates wives Melania Trump and Heidi Cruz, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) is the one that started it by being involved in the super PAC that released a picture of Melania.
Partial transcript as follows:
KARL: Do you categorically guarantee that nobody on your campaign, nobody tied to your campaign has anything to do with this National Enquirer story?
TRUMP: Totally. I had nothing to do with— the campaign had nothing to do with it. He’s got a problem with The National Enquirer. I have no control over The National Enquirer. I had no idea about the story. I just got it last night. I had nothing to do whatsoever with The National Enquirer, neither did the campaign. For him to say I had to do with it, try and put the shoe on the other foot is disgraceful. And by the way, He’s the one that started it. From what I hear, he and his campaign went out and bought the cover shoot. Melania did a cover shoot for GQ a very strong modeling picture. No big deal. But it was a cover shoot for GQ a big magazine. And it was, you know, fine and, if from what I hear, he was the one, or his campaign bought the rights and give it to the super PAC. That super PAC is friendly to Ted Cruz. He started it. I didn’t.
KARL: This rumor mongering. Should this kind of thing just be off limits? Do you condemn this story?
TRUMP: I don’t care. I mean, really, I don’t care. The National Enquirer did a story. It was their story. Not my story. It was about Ted Cruz. I have idea whether it was right or not. They have a good record of being right. I said I hope it’s not right.
KARL: Let’s go back to the thing that started this all off. In fairness, this started with the super PAC ad featuring Melania. But in response…
TRUMP: He’s very close to the super PAC. I call him “Lyin’ Ted.” I call him that because nobody that I’ve known, I’ve known a lot tougher people over the years in business, I have never known anybody that lied like Ted Cruz.
KARL: Let me ask you. In response, you said in that tweet that you would spill the beans on Heidi Cruz. what did you mean by that? Spill what beans?
TRUMP: There are things about Heidi that I don’t want the talk about. But I’m not going the talk about them. You could look. but, I wouldn’t talk about them.
KARL: What really set Cruz off was when you retweeted that photo. That unflattering photo of Heidi Cruz.
TRUMP: Well, it was a retweet somebody sent to me. It was a retweet. Look, what he did was far worse. He takes out a thing and sends it to Utah, the voters of Utah. It was a cover shoot. It was, by a big magazine. She was a very, very successful model. Big model. Did lots of shoots, cover shoots. To send it like it was a bad picture was disgusting to me. They make me like the bad guy here. I’m just responding to what he does. I respond. I counter punch. I’m responding to what he does. The press likes to make me the bad guy. He’s the one that started it. He knew about the picture. He may have even bought the rights to the picture, meaning his campaign. The super PAC had it. He’s close to the super PAC. I didn’t start this. he did.
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.