Chuck Todd delivers knockout punch to exasperated Rudy Giuliani with devastating question
Rudy Giuliani was briefly stumped Sunday morning on "Meet the Press" when host Chuck Todd confronted him with a devastating line of questioning.
The former New York City mayor tried pivoting away from recently surfaced 2005 comments Donald Trump made about women by discussing leaked excerpts from paid speeches Hillary Clinton gave to Wall Street bankers.
"He's not, one thing he's not is what came across in WikiLeaks, and that is two people," Giuliani said. "Hillary Clinton actually specifically described that she's two different people, to the financial people who were giving her millions of dollars, she's on their side and she wants to be a big part of the government. But she tells them she has to pretend to everybody else that she isn't."
Todd then fired a brutal question to the Trump surrogate.
"If you believe that Hillary Clinton says one thing in private and that means what she really is is what she is in private, should we assume what Donald Trump did in that Access Hollywood buzz is really what Donald Trump is like in private?" the NBC anchor asked. "I mean, that's what you're implying here with Hillary Clinton."
Giuliani was left briefly stumped before saying that "the reality is that in both cases, both people have things in their personal lives that maybe if they could redo it, they would do it differently."
"And the reality is that this is a situation in which neither side should throw stones because both sides have sinned," he added.
The Washington Post on Friday published a 2005 hot-mic moment in which Trump boasted about kissing and groping women. At the time, Trump said he could "grab" women "by the p---y" because "when you're a star, they let you do it."
Trump apologized for the remarks in a video published just after midnight on Saturday, but also signaled he'd fight back attacks by pointing to former President Bill Clinton's history with women.
An avalanche of prominent Republicans, including House Speaker Paul Ryan and Priebus, have condemned Trump's comments. Trump's running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, said he was "offended" and could not defend the hot mic remarks.
Some Republicans, including No. 3 Senate Republican John Thune of South Dakota, went as far as to call on the billionaire to step down as the nominee and hand the ticket over to Pence. Trump tweeted Saturday that he would "never" drop out of the race.