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President Donald Trump’s former executive assistant recalled the “bad night” that cost her job at the White House and the importance of being “completely honest” in her new book.
In her first on-camera interview, former director of Oval Office Operations, Madeleine Westerhout spoke with Fox News host Steve Doocy on “Fox & Friends” about getting fired last August after a “lapse in judgment.”
(Source: Fox News)
Westerhout had been Trump’s assistant since he became president, but abruptly left the White House in August 2019 after allegedly disclosing private details about the president and his family when she was at an off-the-record dinner with reporters in New Jersey as the president vacationed.
“On a rare day off after a couple of drinks by the pool, I accepted an invitation to an off-the-record dinner with four reporters and a White House colleague of mine, and at that dinner I said some things that I didn’t mean and that I never should have said,” Westerhout explained on Fox News.
“And I deeply regret that but I take full responsibility for my actions that night,” she said, “and really regret that I hurt people that I care about very, very much.”
Westerhout was named Special Assistant to the President and Executive Assistant to the President in 2017, joining the transition team from the Republican National Committee and having served as an intern for Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign.
As Oval Office director, she enjoyed a desk right outside the West Wing office space and became known as the “gatekeeper” to the Trump White House.
After her departure, the president alluded to her “fully enforceable” confidentiality agreement but also tweeted that she had apologized and he had forgiven her.
While Madeleine Westerhout has a fully enforceable confidentiality agreement, she is a very good person and I don’t think there would ever be reason to use it. She called me yesterday to apologize, had a bad night. I fully understood and forgave her! I love Tiffany, doing great!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 31, 2019
On Tuesday, the president tweeted a shout-out to Westerhout as a “very smart and already wise young woman,” while touting her new book, “Off the Record: My Dream Job at the White House, How I Lost It, and What I Learned.”
….went on at the White House during some extremely interesting and important times. So many good stories by someone who, unlike most other so called writers, was actually there, and a part of the action – of which there was plenty. Go buy this book, a job well done!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 11, 2020
Westerhout told Doocy that she chose to be “completely honest” in her book, even admitting that she had not voted for Trump in 2016.
“I absolutely did not vote for Hillary Clinton,” she added, “but, in 2016, you know, I had never met the president and everything I knew about him I based off what the mainstream media told me, and it wasn’t until I got to know him and know his character that I realized how wrong I had been.”
She also described the president as “a very kind and generous man,” as well as a “great leader and encouraging boss.”
“I cannot wait to cast my vote for him on November 3rd,” she added. “Until then, there is going to be no greater supporter of President Trump than me.”
Westerhout set the record straight on an area where she felt Trump is often “misrepresented,” as she confirmed “his deep admiration and respect for women.”
“He promotes women. He surrounds himself with strong, intelligent women. He is married to one. He has raised two of them,” she told Doocy, referring to Trump’s daughters, Ivanka and Tiffany. “Every interaction I have seen and had with him has just been showing … how much President Trump respects women.”
She explained how the whole experience she had has helped her grow and her decision to write the book was “to get the truth out there and to show the American people the president that I know and love.”
“One of the things that I take most out of this experience is that there is going to be bumps along the road. That’s inevitable. We’re all human,” she said. “I made a mistake and I decided I wasn’t going to let that one night, one mistake, define me.”
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Originally from New York, Powers graduated from New York University and eventually made her way to sunny South Florida where she has been writing for the BizPacReview team since 2015.
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