The gossip website Gawker took credit Sunday for tricking Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump into retweeting a quote from facsist dictator Benito Mussolini.

The retweet left Trump floundering Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." The real estate developer defended his citation of the quote, moments after he also declined to denounce support from former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.

Gawker said Sunday that reporter Ashley Feinberg created a Twitter bot that would post quotes from writings and speeches of Italy's fascist dictator. The tweets used the quotes while praising Trump.

The bot tweeted solely at Trump for multiple times a day since December 2015, Gawker noted.

The one that stuck included the line: "It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep."

Gawker came up with the idea "for that Mussolini bot under the assumption that Trump would retweet just about anything, no matter how dubious or vile the source, as long as it sounded like praise for himself," the website said.

During a Meet the Press Interview on Sunday, Trump said that it didn't matter if the quote belonged to Mussolini.

Asked if wants to be associated with a fascist, Trump said he wants to be "associated with interesting quotes."

Mussolini ruled Italy from 1922 until 1943. He assumed complete control of the state and was a key figure in launching the fascist movement in Europe. He allied Italy with Nazi Germany and led Italy into conflict with the United States and its allies during World War II.