MSNBC's "Morning Joe" slammed former President Bill Clinton Monday for his recent interview where he said he never personally apologized to Monica Lewinsky over their affair and the subsequent scandal that rocked the country.
NBC reporter Craig Melvin asked Clinton if he ever apologized to Lewinsky, which led Clinton to become defensive and talk about how he paid a steep cost for his actions. Clinton and Lewinsky, then a White House intern 27 years his junior, had a series of sexual encounters between 1995 and 1997, culminating in a political scandal that rocked the administration.
"And so what you saw there, I think is the end of Bill Clinton's life as a public figure in this country," MSNBC political commentator Steve Schmidt said. "Because of that interview I don't think he's campaigning anywhere ever again unless he can clean it up and fix it pretty quickly."
Anchor Joe Scarborough said if Clinton wants to be on the campaign trail in 2018, he will need to take responsibility for his actions.
"If he wants to go out and campaign in 2018 which he should, do you own up to the fact that Monica Lewinsky's life has been ruined. That you still have Juanita Broaddrick suffering what she went through," Scarborough said.
"It has been for decades an unbelievable double standard that the Clintons have used and abused where nobody is allowed to go there on this issue and in the age of 'Me Too,' women are supposed to go there," host Mika Brzezinski said.
"My God, he sounded like [President] Trump. He sounded incapable of owning anything," she added.
Scarborough and Brzezinski argued whether the Democratic party need the Clintons. Scarborough believed Democrats desperately need the former president, while Brzezinski argued the party no longer needs him or Hillary Clinton, the 2016 nominee for president.
"As for Democrats, Democrats don't need him, they don't need Hillary. We don't need them," Brzezinski said.
Schmidt said the "tragedy" is Clinton's conduct can be used as a talking point to defend Trump's.
"His great legacy is now we have half the country, any time you talk about the conduct of Donald Trump, anything that's wrong, says like that, 'What about Bill Clinton?'" Schmidt said. "This is the tragedy."