Ken Starr: I will not apologize to Monica Lewinsky

Former independent advisor Ken Starr, whose investigation into President Bill Clinton and his liaison with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, led to the dismissal and near-dismissal of Mr. Clinton , states in a new book that he regrets the turn of his investigation.

In "Contempt: A Memoir of the Clinton Investigation," writes Starr, "I deeply regret that I took the Lewinsky phase of the investigation, but at the same time, as I see twenty years later, had no practical alternative to my turn. "

Appearing on "CBS This Morning" Monday, Starr was asked what parts of the Lewinsky investigation he regretted today?

"I regretted it all," said Starr, "but it had to be done.When we learned that the President of the United States was committing perjury, hindering justice, we went to see the US Attorney General Janet Reno She accepted, and the rest is all history. "

Since the Starr investigation, Lewinsky has been confronted with years of harassment on the Internet and would become an advocate for the fight against cyberbullying.

"Monica Lewinsky said that publishing the Starr report was one of the worst days of her life," said Norah O Donnell, co-host. "She wants excuses, do you want to apologize?"

"No, I will not do it because, unfortunately, the facts are the facts and we have been put in position that under the law in which I was appointed, I had a duty I would say and say many times, I regret all the pain that has resulted for so many people, including the nation, of course I regret it, but no, I can not tell Monica otherwise than I I'm sorry everything happened. "

Starr's office had been alerted to the president's case by a former White House employee, Linda Tripp, who had witnessed the investigation into the death of White House Deputy Counselor Vince Foster. , found dead in July 1993. a suicide

"Linda was the last person in the White House to have seen Vince Foster alive before committing suicide at Fort Marcy Park," said Starr. "And so, she came to us with this information that she was being asked to file a written statement of perjury. That's how it started."

O Donnell asked, "So when do you hear that a woman has information about an alleged affair? [with] the president on whom you are investigating Whitewater, are you saying, "We do not need to investigate it? This is not relevant? What was going through your head in terms of investigation? "

"What was passing through our minds was that we had already seen this model before: find work for another character in the survey, Webb Hubbell, give him clients so that he does not fully cooperate with our same procedure. "We felt that the President had not been sincere in the Whitewater phase of the investigation.So, it was the same pattern."

As recounted in Starr's book, prosecutors questioned Lewinsky after Tripp secretly recorded phone conversations with her. In one operation, they nicknamed "Prom Night," FBI agents interceded with Lewinsky and Tripp in a hotel where they met for lunch. The two men were then taken to adjoining hotel rooms, where Tripp was interrogated, and Lewinsky was offered the choice to cooperate or face charges of perjury.

Co-host Vladimir Duthiers asked: "Why was a sting operation necessary?"

"It was not a painful operation," Starr said. "It was just a way of trying to confirm what we thought we knew, and we knew it, were, in fact, the facts – and give it an opportunity to cooperate with l & # 39; investigation.

"If it had cooperated, this whole thing would have been liquidated in a few weeks and the nation would have been spared, so we treated it with dignity, we treated it with respect and we said," Here is the possibility: you can cooperate with the investigation, which has been authorized by the Attorney General … now please cooperate and move on to something else.

Instead, Lewinsky spoke with his family and, in Starr's words, "did business". The investigation has continued.

O 'Donnell said: "Supreme Court candidate Brett Kavanaugh has worked on your team, worked on this investigation by President Bill Clinton; he wrote and suggested very explicit and salacious questions should be asked of President Clinton, but you have not agreed to do it. Why?"

"Well, we wanted to respect the dignity of the presidency and I think we did," Starr said. "But at the same time, we had to get to the bottom of it and we asked all the prosecutors," What should we ask? "It was a deliberative process."

Starr's report on his investigation of President Clinton was published in September 1998, containing what Starr considered unattainable offenses, including obstruction of justice, perjury and abuse of the office of the President. The House of Representatives by a Republican majority began an impeachment proceeding and on December 19 indicted Clinton on two counts. The president would then be acquitted by the Republican-run Senate, which failed to win a majority to vote either.

"Contempt: a memoir of the Clinton inquiry" by Ken Starr (Sentinel), available via Amazon