Giuliani Shrugs Off Reaction to 'Hand and Knees' Comment on Kim

President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, defended his description of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as being on his “hands and knees” begging just days before a historic summit is scheduled to take place.

Speaking at a conference in Israel on Wednesday, Giuliani said Kim “got back on his hands and knees and begged for it, which is exactly the position you want to put him in,” after Trump canceled the summit, the Associated Press reported. The comments risked upsetting the North Koreans days before the meeting with Trump.

On Thursday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo dismissed his recent comments, saying the former mayor does not speak for the administration on that issue.

"I know Rudy,” Pompeo said at a briefing on Trump’s upcoming North Korea summit. “Rudy doesn't speak for the administration when it comes to this negotiation and this set of issues.”

Pompeo said he took Giuliani's comments as a joke.

“I took him as it being a small room and not being serious about the comments,” Pompeo said. “I think it was a bit in jest.”

“Those are my comments. They have nothing to do with the administration, and a metaphor,” Giuliani said in a telephone interview. “That is my interpretation.”

Giuliani said he hasn’t gotten any response from the administration about his comments and doesn’t expect them to upset the North Koreans. “The only ones sensitive about this are the media,” he said.

Trump canceled the summit after North Korea’s foreign minister criticized Vice President Mike Pence. North Korea responded with a conciliatory statement, and the U.S. resumed plans for the meeting, which is scheduled for June 12 in Singapore.