When John Edwards appeared on ABC’s Nightline Friday night his interview with Bob Woodruff was short and sweet. Edwards ‘fessed up to an affair calling it a mistake, trashed “supermarket” tabloids, said he’d take a DNA test to prove his ex-mistress, Rielle Hunter’s baby wasn’t his, stated that he had no knowledge of alleged hush money paid to Hunter, and talked about how much he loved his wife, Elizabeth.

What the public didn’t see were the parts of Edwards’ interview with Bob Woodruff that ended up on the editing room floor. DBKP took a look at the ABC Nightline transcript and found an interesting tidbit sliced and diced by ABC: Edwards claims the photo of him purportedly holding Hunter’s baby released in the Enquirer August 6 issue is a fake:

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The public saw this exchange between Woodruff and Edwards:

WOODRUFF: I need to ask about probably the most controversial allegation. Which is that a report has been published that the baby of Ms. Hunter is your baby. True?

EDWARDS: Not true. Published in a supermarket tabloid. That is absolutely not true.

WOODRUFF: Have you taken a paternity test?

EDWARDS: I have not, I would welcome participating in a paternity test. Be happy to participate in one. I know that it’s not possible that this child could be mine because of the timing of events, so I know it’s not possible. Happy to take a paternity test, and would love to see it happen.

WOODRUFF: Are you going to do that soon?

EDWARDS: I’m only one side — I’m only one side of the test, but I’m happy to participate in one.

Here’s the part they didn’t get to see:

WOODRUFF: People say they are in contact with her, have told us that you have met her out in California several times. True?

EDWARDS: I met her this last time when I was in California for the very purpose that you and I just spoke about.

WOODRUFF: And that picture is absolutely you and you are holding that baby.

EDWARDS: The picture in the tabloid. I have no idea what that picture is.

WOODRUFF: But you’ve seen it right?

EDWARDS: I did see it and I cannot make any sense out of that. When I went to this meeting you’ve already asked me about, uh, I was not wearing a t-shirt, I was wearing a long-sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up. I don’t know who that picture — I don’t know if that picture is me, it could well be, it looks like me. I don’t know who that baby is, I have no idea what that picture is.

WOODRUFF: But are you saying you don’t remember holding that child of Miss Hunter?

EDWARDS: I’m saying you asked me about this photograph, I don’t know anything about that photograph, I don’t know who that baby is. I don’t know if the picture has been altered, manufactured, if it’s a picture of me taken some other time, holding another baby — I have no idea. I was not at this meeting holding a child for my photograph to be taken I can tell you that.

WOODRUFF: You did say you did meet her at a hotel in California.

EDWARDS: She was there, Mr. McGovern was present, and that’s where the meeting took place.

WOODRUFF: But you don’t remember a baby being there?

EDWARDS: No.

At first blush it seems Edwards is saying that there wasn’t a baby in the Beverly Hilton Hotel on July 21. The same night Edwards was seen by Enquirer reporters entering Hunter’s room at 9:45pm then leaving at 2:40am. The Enquirer reported that their photo was taken of Edwards was when he was in that room.

Edwards’ admitted he was in the room. If you look closely at Woodruff’s question, “But you don’t remember a baby being there?”, Edwards’ answer pertains to his memory of an event. If later it’s proved that a baby was there, then Edwards can claim he had a faulty recollection and not that he had lied.

Woodruff also asked Edwards if he had met Hunter out in California “several times”. Edwards didn’t exactly answer yes or no, instead he said “I met her this last time”, which may have been intentionally vague. No one knows except Edwards and Hunter, and perhaps the National Enquirer, how many times Edwards met with Hunter. It could have been this past spring or it could have been in 2006, which was the time frame of the affair Edwards gave in his interview. He claimed the affair was short and that it ended in 2006. If it’s proved that Edwards met Hunter on more than one occasion in California in 2008, Edwards faces being caught in yet another deception.

Real Photoshop by Doug Ross

As for Edwards’ answer as to whether the photo was him holding a baby in the Enquirer, we wondered why Edwards’ didn’t just say, “hey, that’s a fake photo in the Enquirer”. Instead he said he had no idea what the photo was, it “looked like him” but he claimed he wore a long-sleeved dress shirt and not a t-shirt. He also claimed he’s never seen the baby in the photo.

Edwards did mention something interesting in his answer, he said there was a witness to the meetup with Hunter, Bob McGovern. Did ABC speak to McGovern or Hunter, to verify if there was a baby in the room? As for the grainy quality to the photo, DBKP speculates that it was taken by a cell phone inside the room. If Edwards, a highly successful civil trial attorney, believes the Enquirer published a fake photo of him and a baby, claiming it was his love child, then why hasn’t Edwards publicly threatened to sue the “tabloid trash” pants off the Enquirer?

Edwards claimed that the “supermarket tabloids” were filled with “outrageous accusations” and he chose to deny the affair back in October because the Enquirer’s claims were full of falsehoods. As an attorney, Edwards knows how to separate the wheat from the chaff. Edwards could have threatened litigation over the love child photo, separate from the other story Edwards has confirmed the Enquirer did get right: Edwards had an affair and Edwards did meet Reille Hunter at the Beverly Hilton Hotel on July 21.

By LBG