The mother of Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Defense Department, said she regretted sending her son an email in 2018 accusing him of mistreating women.

She is now calling on senators to support Hegseth in his hard-fought confirmation fight.

Penelope Hegseth said in an interview with Fox News on Wednesday that her son has been “redeemed, forgiven, changed” in the seven years since she wrote an email recently published by The New York Times in which she said it admit “many” women he has “abused in some way” and said their son was the right person to lead the Pentagon under the new Trump administration.

She justified her decision to write the email by saying she wrote it “as a mother” and with “deep feelings” in the midst of her son’s divorce, and said she sent an apology email to her son later that same day -Written email.

“I am sure many of you across the country understand how difficult divorce is for a family. There are emotions. We say things and – I wrote that in a hurry. I wrote this with deep emotions. I wrote that as a mother,” said Penelope Hegseth. “Pete and I are both very passionate people. I wrote this out of love and retracted it about two hours later with an apology email.”

“I don’t think any of this is true. And I’m here, I wouldn’t be sitting in this chair today if I believed that about my son,” she added.

Penelope Hegseth denied that her son abuses women and refused to elaborate on the specific allegations she made in her 2018 email, saying that he “does not abuse women.”

“He’s been through some difficult things. I’m not going to list them by name, but I would just say that some of these, some of these attachments or descriptions are just not true, especially not anymore,” she said.

In the interview, Penelope Hegseth repeatedly urged female senators to ignore allegations about her son’s treatment of women as he faces an uphill battle for confirmation. Hegseth is expected to meet with several Republican senators on Capitol Hill today, including Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst.

“I just hope that today people learn who Pete is, especially our lovely senators, that you listen to him, listen with your heart to the truth about Pete,” she added.