Hillary Clinton calls Donald Trump a “creep” in her new memoir and describes how the now-president’s persistent looming during one of their debates made her skin crawl, according to excerpts released Wednesday.
“We were on a small stage and no matter where I walked, he followed me closely, staring at me, making faces. It was incredibly uncomfortable,” Clinton, who made history last year as the first woman presidential nominee of a major US party, wrote in her upcoming book, titled “What Happened.”
“He was literally breathing down my neck. My skin crawled,” she added, noting that the debate came just days after the release of a shock audio tape in which Trump was heard bragging about groping women.
“What would you do? Do you stay calm, keep smiling and carry on as if he weren’t repeatedly invading your space? Or do you turn, look him in the eye and say loudly and clearly: ‘Back up you creep, get away from me.’”
The excerpts were obtained by MSNBC, which broadcast portions of Clinton’s audio version of the highly-anticipated memoir in which the former first lady dissects her doomed presidential campaign.
The book is set for a September 12 release in the United States.
Clinton has said that after months of reflection on her defeat, she spent much of this year writing a book that aims to pull back the curtain on the strategies — and failures — in one of the most astonishing elections in US history.
In the excerpts she also describes her feelings of having let down the American people.
“I couldn’t get the job done,” she writes. “And I’ll have to live with that for the rest of my life.”