Following the scandal, Lewinsky engaged in a variety of ventures that included designing a line of handbags under her name, serving as an advertising spokesperson for a diet plan, and working as a television personality.

[2][3][1][4] Her father is Bernard Lewinsky, an oncologist, who is the son of German Jews who emigrated from Germany in the 1920s, first moving to El Salvador and then finally to the United States when he was 14.

Lewinsky left her position at the Pentagon in December 1997,[15] and in January 1998 submitted an affidavit in the Paula Jones case denying any physical relationship with Clinton.

On January 26, 1998, Clinton stated, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky" in a nationally televised White House news conference.

[17] The matter instantly occupied the news media, and Lewinsky spent the next weeks hiding from public attention in her mother's residence at the Watergate complex.

[19] Starr obtained a blue dress from Lewinsky with Clinton's semen stained on it, as well as testimony from her that the President had inserted a cigar into her vagina.

[20] In addition, he relied on the definition of "sexual relations" as proposed by the prosecution and agreed by the defense and by Judge Susan Webber Wright, who was hearing the Paula Jones case.

[22] Lewinsky's immunity agreement restricted what she could talk about publicly, but she was able to cooperate with Andrew Morton in his writing of Monica's Story, her biography which included her side of the Clinton affair.

[23] Lewinsky made about $500,000 from her participation in the book and another $1 million from international rights to the Walters interview, but was still beset by high legal bills and living costs.

[25] In June 1999, Ms. magazine published a series of articles by writer Susan Jane Gilman,[26] sexologist Susie Bright,[27] and author-host Abiola Abrams[28] arguing from three generations of women whether Lewinsky's behavior had any meaning for feminism.

"[29] She made a cameo appearance as herself in two sketches during the May 8, 1999, episode of NBC's Saturday Night Live, a program that had lampooned her relationship with Clinton over the prior 16 months.

In September 1999, Lewinsky began to sell a line of handbags bearing her name,[30] under the company name The Real Monica, Inc.[25] They were sold online as well as at Henri Bendel in New York, Fred Segal in California, and The Cross in London.

[25] Lewinsky said that despite her desire to return to a more private life, she needed the money to pay off legal fees, and she believed in the product.

"[32] The choice of Lewinsky as a role model proved controversial for Jenny Craig, and some of its private franchises switched to an older advertising campaign.

[25][33] The company stopped running the Lewinsky ads in February 2000, concluded her campaign entirely in April 2000, and paid her only $300,000 of the $1 million contracted for her involvement.

[25][33] Also at the start of 2000, Lewinsky moved to New York City, lived in the West Village, and became an A-list guest in the Manhattan social scene.

[25] In February 2000, she appeared on MTV's The Tom Green Show, in an episode in which the host took her to his parents' home in Ottawa in search of fabric for her new handbag business.

Later in 2000, Lewinsky worked as a correspondent for Channel 5 in the UK, on the show Monica's Postcards, reporting on U.S. culture and trends from a variety of locations.

[25][34] In March 2002, Lewinsky, no longer bound by the terms of her immunity agreement,[25] appeared in the HBO special, "Monica in Black and White", part of the America Undercover series.

[38] Nevertheless, the show debuted to very high ratings,[37] and Alessandra Stanley wrote in The New York Times: "after years of trying to cash in on her fame by designing handbags and other self-marketing schemes, Ms. Lewinsky has finally found a fitting niche on television.

"[39] The same year she appeared as a guest on the programs V Graham Norton[40] in the UK, High Chaparall[41] in Sweden, and The View[42] and Jimmy Kimmel Live!

[43] in the U.S. After Clinton's autobiography, My Life, appeared in 2004, Lewinsky said in an interview with the British tabloid Daily Mail:[44] He could have made it right with the book, but he hasn't.

I don't accept that he had to completely desecrate my character.By 2005, Lewinsky found that she could not escape the spotlight in the U.S., which made both her professional and personal life difficult.

[51] During her decade out of the public eye, Lewinsky lived in London, Los Angeles, New York, and Portland but, due to her notoriety, had trouble finding employment in the communications and marketing jobs for nonprofit organizations where she had been interviewed.

"[49] The magazine later announced her as a Vanity Fair contributor, stating she would "contribute to their website on an ongoing basis, on the lookout for relevant topics of interest".

[55][56] In July 2014, Lewinsky was interviewed in a three-part television special for the National Geographic Channel, titled The 90s: The Last Great Decade.

"[59][60] She said she was influenced by reading about the suicide of Tyler Clementi, a Rutgers University freshman, involving cyberbullying[59] and joined Twitter to facilitate her efforts.

[67] Lewinsky wrote the foreword[68] to an October 2017 book by Sue Scheff and Melissa Schorr, Shame Nation: The Global Epidemic of Online Hate.

In discussing the series and her observations on social media and cancel culture today in an interview with Kara Swisher for the New York Times Opinion podcast Sway,[79] Lewinsky noted that: I think that the first thing that went out the door in 1998 was the truth, and the second was context.