Rachel Uchitel Reveals She Rejected 'Celebrity Apprentice' as She 'Didn't Trust' Donald Trump

Before Donald Trump took over the Oval Office, he built a name for himself as the host of The Apprentice and The Celebrity Apprentice. While Trump tends to look back at his reality TV days with fondness, the show otherwise has been criticized by many. Recently, Rachel Uchitel opened up about rejecting an offer from Trump to appear on The Celebrity Apprentice, over a decade ago.

“Donald Trump called my phone at, like, 7…one morning. I was in Las Vegas. I’ll never forget. I woke up and it was Donald Trump on the other end of the line asking me to do Apprentice,” she said in an interview, as reported by Page Six. She added, “We talked about it and I basically said yes because why wouldn’t I?” However, she later turned down the offer. The interviewer inquired about the reason for the same, and Uchitel answered, “I didn’t actually say no, I said yes at first, and then I chose at the last minute to do Celebrity Rehab because I didn’t trust [Trump] would represent me the way I wanted to be represented.”

The podcaster added, “I wanted to make sure he would make me look exactly how I portrayed myself and I was very nervous because of the click-bait kind of stuff. [I thought] I would be fired immediately just because he thought that that would make headlines — people didn’t like me at the time obviously.” She further disclosed, “They were filming at the same time. I decided to do ‘Celebrity Rehab’ for the reason that I felt like, ‘Listen, everybody in the world hates me right now. They’re talking about me in a way that I don’t even recognize.’”

“It upset me so much that people had such a bad vision of me but didn’t know me,” she continued. Uchitel was alluding to Tiger Woods’ extramarital affair scandal that made headlines in late 2009, tarnishing her public image. “That’s why I chose to do ‘Celebrity Rehab’ because I had three weeks of being on the show, they weren’t going to edit me in a certain way. They could have, but it ended up being the right choice.” Additionally, she claimed that Trump was quite unhappy with her decision. “Donald Trump was sort of pissed I chose to do the other show and I believe something came out on TMZ later, where he was like ‘I don’t know that woman,’ which I thought was crazy, but very Donald Trump."

The reality star also discussed a movie titled The Apprentice that is currently being made. "It seems like nothing can hurt his campaign. I think people will definitely watch it. You may not like him as a human, you may not want him as your president but I think people will watch,” she stated. First announced in 2018, the movie is said to follow a young Trump during his early career in the '70s and '80s as he builds his real estate empire in New York City. As reported by People Magazine, the film will also feature several actors portraying key figures from Trump’s inner circle.