Hillary Clinton contradicts Monica Lewinsky’s claim that affair with Bill Clinton was ‘gross abuse of power’

Hillary Clinton has defended her husband against accusations that he abused his power with an affair with Monica Lewinsky in the 1990s.

Ms Lewinsky said in a recent interview that she had been moved by the stories brought forth by women in the #MeToo movement, and had realised that former President Bill Clinton had abused his position of power when they had an affair.

Ms Clinton, who stood by her husband after those accusations came forward, disagreed during an interview on “CBS Sunday Morning”.

“In retrospect, do you think Bill should've resigned in the wake of the Monica Lewinsky scandal?” Tony Dokoupil, a CBS correspondent, asked her during that interview.

“Absolutely not,” Ms Clinton said.

“It wasn't an abuse of power?” Mr Dokoupil asked.

“No. No,” Ms Clinton said.

“But let me ask you this,” Ms Clinton continued, “Where's the investigation of the current incumbent, against whom numerous allegations have been made, and which he dismisses, denies, and ridicules?”

Clinton was referring to multiple allegations of sexual assault and harassment levelled against President Donald Trump, which Trump has denied.

The interview comes after a year in which predominantly powerful men have been forced to resign or step back from public life after allegations have been made that they abused their power to sexually harass or abuse women in the workplace.

As women came forward with their stories, Ms Lewinsky said she had something of a change of heart. While she had engaged in the affair voluntarily, she said that she had realized that the power dynamics at play when she was a 22-year-old White House intern sleeping with the then-president were a clear abuse of power.

“[W]hat transpired between Bill Clinton and myself was not sexual assault, although we now recognise that it constituted a gross abuse of power,” she wrote in Vanity Fair in March.

Ms Clinton said that during the affair Ms Lewinsky “was an adult.” The former secretary of state said of the subsequent investigation into her husband, “I believe, came out in the right place.”