Weiner Spokesperson Calls Former Intern a “Fucking Slutbag” and “Cunt”
Things aren't going well for Anthony Weiner's mayoral campaign. There was the second round of dick pics, the campaign manager quitting, the drop in the polls, and the non-answer about whether or not he is sexting someone at this exact moment. And now this: on Tuesday, Weiner's communications director called a former intern for the campaign a “fucking slutbag,” a “twat,” and a “cunt.”
Tuesday morning, the New York Daily News published an critical article about the inner-workings of Weiner's mayoral bid, written by Olivia Nuzzi, a former intern for the campaign. Among other things, Nuzzi claimed most of Weiner's staffers were either very inexperienced or only working the campaign to gain favor with Weiner's wife, Huma Abedin, presumably for her connection to Hillary Clinton. Nuzzi also wrote, in post for NSFWCORP, that there had been “six departures” from the campaign, which is more than had been previously disclosed.
When Talking Points Memo's Hunter Walker reached out to the Weiner campaign for comment, Weiner's communications director Barbara Morgan said the following about Nuzzi:
“I’m dealing with like stupid fucking interns who make it on to the cover of the Daily News even though they signed [Non-disclosure agreements] and/or they proceeded to trash me,” Morgan told TPM. “And by the way, I tried to fire her, but she begged to come back and I gave her a second chance.”
But Morgan wasn't finished. “Fucking slutbag. Nice fucking glamour shot on the cover of the Daily News. Man, see if you ever get a job in this town again,” Morgan said, adding that she didn't think Nuzzi's claims were true “It's all bullshit. I mean, it's such bullshit. She could fucking— fucking twat.”
Morgan also criticized Nuzzi's job performance. “She sucked. She like wasn’t good at setting up events. She was clearly there because she wanted to be seen. Like it was, like, terrible and I had to like - she would like, she would just not show up for work,” said Morgan. “For the four weeks she worked there — she didn’t work weekends, so twenty days total. Of those twenty days, she missed probably five because she would just like not show up and not tell me she wasn’t going to be there. So, yeah, so there’s that.”
In response to Nuzzi's claims that many on the campaign, including Morgan herself, were inexperienced, Morgan said this:
“And then like she had the fucking balls to like trash me in the paper. And be like, ‘His communications director was last the press secretary of the Department of Education in New Jersey,” Morgan said. “You know what? Fuck you, you little cunt. I’m not joking, I am going to sue her.”
Not long after Walker published the story, Morgan told the New York Observer's Jill Colvin that she thought the conversation was off the record.
.@BarbaraKMorgan tells me she thought she was off the record #whoops
— Jill Colvin (@colvinj) July 31, 2013
No comment on the issue yet from Weiner, but we know from a campaign commercial released earlier today that to "Quit isn't the way we roll in New York City.”
UPDATE 10:34 pm: Morgan just issued an apology for her statements:
“In a moment of frustration, I used inappropriate language in what I thought was an off the record conversation. It was wrong and I am very sorry, which is what I said tonight when I called and emailed Olivia to apologize,” Morgan said in a statement emailed about an hour after TPM published its report.
[Image via AP]
To contact the author of this post, email taylor@gawker.com