- “The Apprentice” producer Bill Pruitt says Donald Trump used the N-word.
- Pruitt wrote in Slate that the moment was captured on video but will likely never be made public.
- A Trump campaign spokesman called Pruitt’s account a “completely fabricated story.”
A producer for “The Apprentice” said Donald Trump was recorded using the N-word and that the footage will probably never see the light of day.
Bill Pruitt, one of four producers on the show’s first two seasons, wrote in a Slate editorial that he signed a non-disclosure agreement that expires this year, nearly 20 years after “The Apprentice” first aired.
Pruitt wrote that the show recorded its off-camera deliberations over firing contestants in case the show faced questions from the Federal Communications Commission, which bans rigging of game shows.
Pruitt said Trump used the derogatory term while discussing first season finalists Bill Rancic and Kwame Jackson.
After one of Trump’s employees and advisers spoke favorably about Jackson on the show, Pruitt claims Trump asked, “Would America buy it if we won?”
A Trump campaign spokesperson told Slate that Pruitt’s story was “a completely fabricated, false story that was already spread in 2016.” The spokesperson blamed “desperate” Democrats for the allegation resurfacing.
Pruitt wrote in Slate that the producers who heard Trump’s remarks never discussed the incident at the time, and that the tape will likely never be found.
A representative for NBCUniversal declined to comment.
Pruitt is not the first “Apprentice” insider to claim that Trump used the N-word.
Omarosa Manigault Newman, who appeared on the show’s first season and previously worked in the Trump administration, said she had heard a tape of Trump using derogatory language. Trump denied the existence of the tape at the time and called Manigault Newman a “freak and a nut.”
Rumors about “The Apprentice” outtake tapes have been swirling for years.
Mark Burnett, the reality TV mogul and creator of the show, denounced Trump before the 2016 election, but he maintained he had no legal right to release any of the tapes, and lawyers for MGM, which bought Burnett’s production company, acknowledged at the time that he didn’t have the right to release any of the footage.
“The Apprentice is owned by MGM, not Mark Burnett. MGM has contracts with artists for a wide range of creative endeavors, including The Apprentice. These contracts typically contain confidentiality and artist rights clauses,” MGM’s outside counsel, Marvin S. Putnam, said in a statement at the time.
