How the Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton affair unfolded

In 1998, the world watched as then-president Bill Clinton was charged with perjury and became embroiled in a high-profile impeachment trial – all sparked by his affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. With moments such as Mr Clinton’s lie that he “did not have sexual relations with that woman” going down in history, the proceedings have followed Lewinsky throughout her life.

On the Call Her Daddy podcast, hosted by Alex Cooper, Lewinsky said: “I think that the right way to handle a situation like that would’ve been to probably say it was nobody’s business and to resign. “Or to find a way to stay in office that was not lying and not throwing a young person who is just starting out in the world under the bus.

In 2021, she produced a new series of American Crime Story based on the events, called Impeachment: American Crime Story. Interest in Lewinsky, who was an unpaid 22-year-old White House intern when she met 49-year-old Mr Clinton, has grown recently in the wake of the MeToo movement – reassessing the relationship between the pair – as well as the 2020 death of affair whistle-blower Linda Tripp, who passed away of pancreatic cancer.

Mr Clinton has since said that Lewinsky “paid quite a price” for the affair, though Lewinsky has since established herself as an anti-bullying activist and spoken openly about the “avalanche of pain and humiliation” she experienced. Lewinsky was played by Booksmart’s Beanie Feldstein in the Ryan Murphy series and explained why she had decided to produce it.

“People have been co-opting and telling my part in this story for decades. In fact, it wasn't until the past few years that I've been able to fully reclaim my narrative; almost 20 years later,” she said. "This isn't just a me problem. Powerful people, often men, take advantage of those subordinate to them in myriad ways all the time,” she said. “Many people will see this as such a story and for that reason, this narrative is one that is, regretfully, evergreen.”.

In July 1995, a 21-year-old Lewinsky managed to land an unpaid internship as a White House intern during the Clinton administration. A report by independent counsel Kenneth Starr, who investigated Mr Clinton, stated, “During the shutdown, Ms Lewinsky worked in Chief of Staff Panetta's West Wing office, where she answered phones and ran errands. The President came to Mr Panetta's office frequently because of the shutdown, and he sometimes talked with Ms Lewinsky.”.

“She characterised these encounters as 'continued flirtation’. According to Lewinsky, a Senior Adviser to the Chief of Staff, Barry Toiv, remarked to her that she was getting a great deal of 'face time' with the President,” it continued. The Starr Report claimed Lewinsky and Mr Clinton, who was 49 at the time, flirted – which included moments such as Lewinsky showing him “the straps of her thong underwear” as she lifted up her jacket.

On November 15, 1995, Lewinsky, now 22, was invited to Mr Clinton’s private study by the president and she testified that they had acknowledged “we were both attracted to each other” – leading the president to ask if he could kiss her and her leaving her number for him.

On the same day, she was later asked again by the president to come to his private study where they began their sexual relationship. They continued to see each other over the course of 18 months, with Lewinsky testifying they had 10 sexual encounters (eight while she worked at the White House and two after she had been sent to the Pentagon).

They also spoke at length on the phone and exchanged gifts, which included Lewinsky giving him several neckties and Mr Clinton giving her a special edition of Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. Although Mr Clinton ended the relationship in February 1996 on President’s Day, he later called her to his office on March 1996 where they resumed their relationship and had a sexual encounter.

Lewinsky said that she “never expected to fall in love with the President," but added, “I was surprised that I did.”. Lewinsky was later transferred to the Pentagon in 1996 after White House staff “thought she hung around the Oval Office too much and transferred her”.

“[People] were wary of his weaknesses, maybe, and . . . they didn't want to look at him and think that he could be responsible for anything, so it had to all be my fault,” she later said. In her dismissal interview with staff director Timothy Keating in April 1996, she is said to have asked to stay on at the White House with tears in her eyes.

Lewinsky said of Mr Keating's response, “He told me I was too sexy to be working in the East Wing and that this job at the Pentagon where I'd be writing press releases was a sexier job... I was never going to see the President again. I mean, my relationship with him would be over.”.

It was at the Pentagon that she met Linda Tripp while working in the public affairs office. Lewinsky began to disclose details of her and Mr Clinton’s relationship. Ms Tripp, who had come forward to talk about Mr Clinton’s alleged sexual harassment of another colleague Kathleen Willey, was grilled extensively by Mr Clinton’s team after Lewinsky shared that she was talking to Newsweek about it.