Caitlyn Jenner has broken her silence on daughter Kendall’s controversial Pepsi ad, sticking up for the model following the backlash.
Earlier this month, Kendall starred in a new advertising campaign for the drinks company, in which she appeared at the forefront of a generic protest, culminating in her making peace with a police officer by handing him a can of Pepsi.
The ad - which carried the tagline ‘Join The Conversation’ - was eventually pulled 24 hours after first being shared online, after being dragged over the coals on social media.
Sticking up for her daughter, Caitlyn has now addressed the controversy in a new interview with broadcaster Andy Cohen on SiriusXF.
The former Olympian and reality star said: “I saw it. Actually I was with my assistant when it came out online, I looked at it and I said ‘oh that’s so cool’. You know, it talks about ‘join the conversation’... it was cute.
Sharing her take on the aftermath, Caitlyn added: “I felt sorry for Kendall, and then once that side of it… and I think it was a majority, because Pepsi came back and tested the commerical, and it had like 72% likes, but there was a small portion out there that obviously was very verbal.
Caitlyn later elaborated to the US edition of HuffPost: “We live in a very tough political environment, social environment.
“You have massive amounts of media looking for a story and obviously some people were looking at that commercial very differently than the way I was looking at it. I get that. And Kendall gets that too. She didn’t mean any malice.”
Kendall is yet to respond publicly to the controversy surrounding the ad, though Pepsi later issued a public apology to the model and ‘Keeping Up With The Kardashians’ star, for “putting [her] in this position”.
Before deciding to pull the advert, Pepsi had defended it from the backlash, saying: “This is a global ad that reflects people from different walks of life coming together in a spirit of harmony. We think that’s an important message to convey.”