Billionaire presidential candidate Tom Steyer said Friday he "of course" overheard the squabble between Sens. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) after last week's debate, contradicting his previous denials.
"I was asked over and over and over what they were saying to each other, which of course I could hear, but I also felt like it was a private conversation they were having," Steyer told Fox News. "My oldest son texted me.... He said, 'Dad, whatever you do, don't be a snitch.'"
He didn't let down his son, repeatedly saying after the Jan. 14 debate that he did not know what Sanders and Warren were arguing about. The dispute was over Sanders's denial of Warren's claim Sanders told her a woman could not be elected president.
Steyer found himself awkwardly between the two during the tense exchange.
"I didn't really hear," Steyer told CBS News in the spin room afterward. "I think they were trying to figure out something between the two of them, but I didn't really hear what it was."
"I really wasn't listening," Steyer told a CNN panel after the debate. "The last thing I wanted to do was get in between the two of them and try and listen in. That was not my goal and I didn't do it."
"I didn't really hear it, Alisyn," he told CNN's Alisyn Camerota the following morning. "I was going over to say good night."
CNN later released audio from a hot mic which recorded Warren accusing Sanders of calling her a liar.