NEW YORK (AP) " Billy Bush says it was indeed Donald Trump's voice captured on a 2005 "Access Hollywood" tape talking about fame enabling him to grope and try to have sex with women.

In an op-ed published Sunday in The New York Times the former "Access Hollywood" and "Today" show personality says, "Of course he said it."

Bush writes everyone nearby at the time thought they were listening to "a crass standup act."

The tape emerged during the 2016 presidential campaign and prompted more than a dozen women to come forward to say that Trump had sexually assaulted or harassed them. He denied it.

Bush says he felt the need to write the piece following reports that Trump has privately suggested that the tape is not authentic.