‘She Gained a Massive Amount of Weight, and It Was a Real Problem’
During Monday night’s presidential debate, and again Tuesday morning on “Fox & Friends” Donald Trump talked about a former Miss Universe who says he berated her and treated her terribly – including not paying her per her contract. Hillary Clinton accused Trump of having called Alicia Machado “Miss Piggy,” because she had gained weight after winning the crown, and “Miss Housekeeping” because she is Hispanic.
“She was the worst we ever had. The worst, the absolute worst,” Trump, the former owner of Miss Universe, said Tuesday on “Fox & Friends,” attempting to defend himself.
“She was impossible, and she was a Miss Universe contestant and ultimately a winner who they had a tremendously difficult time with as Miss Universe,” he added. “She was the winner, and, you know, she gained a massive amount of weight, and it was a real problem. We had a real problem. Not only that, her attitude, and we had a real problem with her.”
She confirms Trump did call her “Miss Piggy” and “Miss Housekeeping.”
Machado explains that after winning the crown, she participated in more ad campaigns than any winner before her, earning Trump’s company more “a lot of money.”
She says her contract stipulated that she was supposed to be paid 10 percent of all the commercials and work she did.
“I was never paid.”
When she gained weight, Trump, the video says, threatened to take her crown away.
“He was very overwhelming. I was very scared of him,” Machado says. “He’d yell at me all the time.”
“He’d tell me, ‘You look ugly,’ or, ‘You look fat.'”Â
In the video, which was released by the Clinton campaign Tuesday, the 1996 Miss Universe winner narrates her story, complete with clips of Trump talking about her. At one point it even shows him fat-shaming her publicly by bringing reporters into a gym to show her working out.
“This is somebody that likes to eat,” Trump told reporters.
“It was very humiliating,” Machado says. “Long after I was sick with eating disorders.”
“I wouldn’t eat, and would still see myself as fat, because a powerful man had said so.”
“This is a man who doesn’t realize the damage he causes,” Machado says. “He bears many grudges and harbors a deep racism.”
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