Cindy McCain admitted today that she was angry with the New York Times for reporting on her husband John's alleged extramarital affair but said she "knew the truth" about his fidelity.
The wife of the Republican presidential nominee said her first words to McCain after the alleged affair was revealed were, "I love you. I know this isn't true." His response, she added, was the "same thing".
"I was angry at the newspaper, of course, but I knew the truth," McCain, who is 18 years younger than her presidential-hopeful husband, told the television chat show Access Hollywood.
"I think that is the unfortunate side of politics, and I think that is also the unfortunate side sometimes of this 24-hour news cycle that we are in now," she added. "But it's over with, we have moved on, and I am not concerned about it."
The Times report, published six weeks ago, raised the prospect that McCain had an affair in the 1990s with telecommunications lobbyist Vicki Iseman.
Some of Iseman's corporate clients had business before the Senate committee that McCain chaired. Both McCain and Iseman denied the alleged affair.
Meanwhile, the Times faced scrutiny from critics on both the left and the right who questioned why the newspaper played up the unproven infidelity charge at the expense of evidence that McCain took official actions to help Iseman's clients.
McCain's wife also addressed her past addiction to prescription painkillers during the early 1990s, telling the chat show, "It made me a better person as well as a better parent".
"I think it would be very important to talk about it and be very upfront about it," McCain said.
McCain's appearance on the chat show may help her 72-year-old husband appeal to the younger voters who have flocked in droves to Democratic candidate Barack Obama.
The Republican nominee has benefited from the sudden celebrity of his 23-year-old daughter, Meghan, who keeps a popular campaign blog.
McCain recently picked up the unlikely endorsement of Heidi Montag, the blonde star of MTV's hit show The Hills. His wife said their daughter keeps the candidate up on pop-culture trends: "He certainly knew about the show."