"I want to apologize to America. I helped create a monster." "For nearly 25 years, I led marketing at NBC and NBCUniversal. I led the team that marketed The Apprentice,' the reality show that made Donald Trump a household name outside of New York City, where he was better known for overextending his empire and appearing in celebrity gossip columns." "To sell the show, we created the narrative that Trump was a super-successful businessman who lived like royalty. That was the conceit of the show. At the very least, it was a substantial exaggeration; at worst, it created a false narrative by making him seem more successful than he was." In fact, Trump declared business bankruptcy four times before the show went into production, and at least twice more during his 14 seasons hosting.