Kanye West publicly apologized for his behavior at Sunday night’s MTV Video Music Awards during an interview with Jay Leno on Monday night’s premiere episode of The Jay Leno Show on NBC.

While he was originally set to serve as just a musical guest – performing with Jay-Z and Rihanna — Kanye spoke to Jay for several minutes before taking the stage to talk about storming the VMA stage and upstaging Best Female Music Video winner Taylor Swift during the 19-year-old’s acceptance speech.

“It’s been extremely difficult, just dealing with the fact that I hurt [someone] or took anything away… from a talented artist, or from anyone because I only wanted to help people,” Kanye told Jay. “My entire life I’ve only wanted to give and do something that I felt was right and I immediately knew in this situation that it was wrong and it wasn’t a spectacle, it’s actually someone’s emotions… that I stepped on… It was rude, period. I’d like to be able to apologize to her in person.”

When asked by Jay when he realized he was wrong, Kanye replied: “Like as soon as I gave the mic back to her and she didn’t keep going.”

Jay then went on to bring up Kanye’s late mother, Dr. Donda West, during the interview, mentioning that he met her and asking the rapper what his mother would have said about her son’s behavior.
Kanye struggled to find the words to answer the question and appeared to choke up.