Since Donna Karan founded Donna Karan New York in 1984, her clothes have been emblematic of working women, from Hillary Clinton as First Lady to Candice Bergen’s Murphy Brown. So it was especially surprising when she parroted victim-blaming talking points to the Daily Mail last week, just days after the initial New York Times report on Harvey Weinstein’s entrenched sexual misconduct broke. She told the Mail in a red carpet interview that Weinstein and his wife are “wonderful people” and then asked some questions:

I also think how do we display ourselves? How do we present ourselves as women? What are we asking? Are we asking for it by presenting all the sensuality and all the sexuality? . . . You look at everything all over the world today and how women are dressing and what they are asking by just presenting themselves the way they do. What are they asking for? Trouble.

One of Weinstein’s alleged victims, Rose McGowan, called Karan “scum in a fancy dress”; she was far from the only critic. Karan released a statement days later that called her quotes “taken out of context.” But she showed even more contrition while speaking with Bridget Foley, executive editor of fashion trade publication Women’s Wear Daily on Monday. Here she is making a meal of her words:

It was not what I meant. I [so regret] that that came out of my mouth because, as I was avoiding Harvey, and what [a] blur . . . I am really, really apologetic. I have been dressing women for 40 years and I show their sensuality, I have done it in my advertising campaign, I have shown it as a mother, as a grandmother, as a woman, [I’ve shown] her legs and her hosiery and her bras and her fragrance. And I have always had men and women together.

So the fact of what I said was—it was inappropriate and I just went off. And I shouldn’t have done it. I was exhausted, I was tired and— [when] it came back to me, I was shocked that I even said this myself. Because I was preparing in my mind what I was going to say in the theater. And I just went off on something that I shouldn’t have, and I apologize profusely. I regret it so strongly.

In her telling, Karan caught herself by surprise. “I was shocked,” she said. “I was absolutely in a state of shock. I said, ‘I said that?’ That was the first thing out of my mouth. ‘What? I didn’t say that. That’s ridiculous.’”

There is still a 14,148-strong petition asking Nordstrom to drop the line and #BoycottDKNY gained some traction in the last week. Karan, however, stepped down from her eponymous brand in 2015, so though the designer stepped in it, it’s not likely to stick, unlike some other public figures finding that no distance from Harvey Weinstein is far enough.