By CASSIE COPE, The State
COLUMBIA— Entertainment Tonight anchor Nancy O’Dell, the woman at the heart of the controversy over Donald Trump’s crass comments, is a Clemson University graduate and Miss South Carolina 1987.
O’Dell responded Saturday to the vulgar remarks Donald Trump has admitted to making about her in 2005.
O’Dell said in a statement she was “saddened that these comments still exist in our society at all,” adding “it was disappointing to hear such objectification of women.”
“The conversation needs to change because no female, no person, should be the subject of such crass comments, whether or not cameras are rolling,” O’Dell said.
“Everyone deserves respect no matter the setting or gender,” she said. “As a woman who has worked very hard to establish her career, and as a mom, I feel I must speak out with the hope that as a society we will always strive to be better.”
The Washington Post on Friday published a video of GOP presidential nominee Trump talking with Billy Bush, now co-host of the “Today” show.
Trump used vulgar language when telling Bush that he hit on O’Dell.
O’Dell is an Emmy award-winning journalist and author of three books. She was inducted into the South Carolina Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame in 1998.
O’Dell graduated in the top 2 percent of her class at Clemson University, according to her biography. The university awarded her an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree in May 2013.
www.goupstate.com/news/20161008/subject-of-vulgar-trump-comments-is-former-miss-sc