WASHINGTON ― Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway on Sunday poured cold water on the idea of Trump inviting Gennifer Flowers, a woman who alleges that she carried on a 12-year affair with former President Bill Clinton, to Monday’s presidential debate.
Donald Trump tweeted on Saturday that “perhaps” he would put Flowers in the debate audience, but Conway told CNN’s Jake Tapper that his campaign has not “invited her formally” and does not expect her to be there.
Trump raised the possibility of Flowers sitting in the front row after billionaire Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban said the campaign for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton had given him a front-row seat to the first debate.
An assistant to Flowers told BuzzFeed on Saturday that she had agreed to come to the debate as a Trump guest. It now seems like an invite never quite made it to Flowers, who Bill Clinton did admit to having “sexual relations” with one time in 1977.
Conway also said on ABC’s “This Week” that the Trump campaign had not invited Flowers to the debate, but she didn’t rule out the possibility of Flowers being in the audience.
“She has a right to be there if someone else gives her a ticket,” Conway said.
Still, it was a characteristic backtrack from Conway, who has constantly looked to soften Trump and his basest inclinations to attack people. She said this whole mini-story was really an example of the Clinton campaign overreacting.
“I can not believe how easily baited the Clinton campaign was,” Conway said, mentioning a statement from Clinton’s communications director that suggested that the former secretary of state would be using the debate to talk issues while Trump clearly had chosen “a different path.”
Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.