Trump still firing at Stewart

updated 10:33 p.m. ET Feb. 22, 2006

Donald Trump was still heavily in attack mode Wednesday.

The Donald continued to blister Martha Stewart for her statements in the current Newsweek that “Martha Stewart: The Apprentice” flopped last fall because Trump would not yank his competing show off the air.

Her show, which was axed after one cycle, was supposed to be the sole “Apprentice” and was meant to start out with her firing Trump on the air, she told the magazine, repeating comments she’d made before.

“How ridiculous is that?” Trump fumed on “Inside Edition” in an interview slated for Wednesday evening. “You have the number one show on television and they’re going to fire me and she’s going to take my place? Do you think NBC would take that chance?”

FREE VIDEO The Clash of the Titans Feb. 22: The war of words between Donald Trump and Martha Stewart has been heating up.  The Village Voice's Michael Musto provided his special brand of blow by blow commentary on Countdown with Keith Olbermann. MSNBC

Trump also offered Stewart some advice: “She should just go into the sunset, relax, have her little daytime show, and have it do as well as it can do, which isn’t particularly well.”

The real-estate mogul turned TV-Titan continued his assault on “Extra,” also airing Wednesday.

“I think Martha owes me an apology, but I don’t really expect one,” he said.

Stewart used her Wednesday episode of her syndicated daytimer, “Martha,” to offer a response.

“Well, before we get to my first guest, I want to address what’s happening with Donald Trump,” she told viewers. “I am disappointed, I am hurt and I am really upset at my longtime friend. That’s really all I want to say. Enough about it.”

The feudin’ and fussin’ kicked into high gear Tuesday when Trump responded to Stewart’s Newsweek comments with a venomous letter. Her “Apprentice,” he wrote, was “a mistake for everybody — especially NBC,” and asserted that the network did not intend to fire him on her show.

“Essentially, you made this firing up just as you made up your sell order of ImClone,” said Trump, in the letter’s most caustic remark. Stewart, who lost an appeal last month that ended her criminal case for lying about a stock sale, served five months in jail and nearly six months of house arrest for her transgression.

In a statement issued Tuesday in response to Trump’s missive, Stewart said she was “very proud” of her collaboration with Trump on her “Apprentice” (he served as a producer) and was stunned by his letter.

“The letter is so mean-spirited and reckless that I almost can’t believe my longtime friend Donald Trump wrote it,” she said.

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