Newt Tells Greta: It Was a Bit Much for CNN to Start Debate with Such Nonsense

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich is riding a political roller coaster today. He picked up an endorsement from former rival Governor Rick Perry, but he's also facing sharp accusations from an ex-wife. Speaker Gingrich joins us from Charleston.

Good evening, sir.

NEWT GINGRICH, GOP PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Good to be with you, Greta.

VAN SUSTEREN: And since you just joined us, I'll tell you, in all fairness, that we started with that exchange you had with John King, and you hardly left any skin on him when you were finished with it, that back and forth.

But I'm curious, in all seriousness, is there any appropriate time in your mind that you be asked that question, you know, about your ex-wife?

GINGRICH: Look...

VAN SUSTEREN: She's going on television. She's making some accusation. Is it a fair question? And if so, when should it be asked of you?

GINGRICH: Sure, look -- look, if voters ask it or if you get asked it in a normal press conference, you just answer it because you're running for president and you owe people a candid answer. You don't particularly want to get in fights that involve 20-year-old incidents.

You know, it wasn't true, and I'm happy to say it wasn't true. And we have five or six people who know us at the time, all of whom are willing to say it's not true. And we offered those to the media.

I just thought to open a national presidential debate at that kind of personal level, with such nonsense -- and the audience -- you could tell the audience agreed totally that it was just nonsense. We have big things in this country, jobs, balancing the budget, defending America, reestablishing American values, economic growth, lots of things to talk about other than that.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right. Well, I'm -- I'm actually -- I'm always concerned about the fairness aspect of this stuff, and what caught my attention, besides the fact that you -- John King, my old colleague, hardly had any skin left on him -- was -- was the -- you said that you had offered these people to ABC. And I was only going to ask you one question about it, but I heard you say that. And I'm curious, I mean, was ABC simply unwilling to talk to the people to hear what they had to say? Because that's obviously an important issue.

GINGRICH: Well, after a great deal of conversation, they finally agreed to take my two daughters, who you know, Kathy Lubbers and Jackie Cushman, and they are going to appear on the show tonight. I think they're doing "Good Morning America" tomorrow. But it was only after a great deal of conversation.

We have a number of other people who were personal friends, eyewitnesses at the time. They weren't interested. So you end up on one of these things where, you know, you don't want to go back and relive some kind of deep personal problems, knowing that each party had very different memories of 15 years ago.