Hillary Clinton has a big speech to deliver in Nevada on Thursday, one she hopes will put her squarely ahead of Donald Trump among those who fear the rise of the “alt-right”-but she might be in for a tougher time than she expects”.
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At least 85 of 154 people from private interests who met or had phone conversations scheduled with Clinton while she led the State Department donated to her family charity or pledged commitments to its worldwide programs, according to a review of State Department calendars released so far to The Associated Press. Combined, the donors contributed as much as $156 million to the charity.
The Clinton campaign responded saying the AP’s data is flawed and omitted more than 1,700 meetings she took with world leaders.
“No, no, look – I know there is a lot of smoke and there is no fire”, Clinton replied, before blasting an Associated Press report out this week that said more than half of the private citizens with whom she met while at the State Department donated to the foundation.
Speaking to CNN’s Anderson Cooper in her first national news interview in almost a month, Clinton pushed back against Trump’s accusations and issued perhaps her most succinct answers on her use of a private email server during her time leading the State Department.
The campaign insisted the foundation had no influence on her work at the State Department.
“You know, I might like the first way better”. She said it excluded 2,000 meetings she had held with world leaders and USA government officials and came to the conclusion that meetings she held with philanthropists like Melinda Gates or Nobel Prize victor Muhammad Yunus was connected to the foundation.
Clinton’s team continues to insist she did nothing wrong.
At a rally in Jackson, Trump called Clinton a bigot who has taken minority votes for granted. “I have been asked many, many questions in the past year about emails and what I have learned is that when I try to explain what happened, it can sound like I am trying to excuse what I did”.
Trump tops Clinton as more honest and trustworthy (49% to 39%), and 11% say neither major party candidate for president has the edge on honesty.
The Clinton Foundation, the family philanthropy of Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, should shut down or transfer operations to another charity despite its good work to avoid perceptions of “pay-for-play”, The Washington Post and USA Today said in editorials on Wednesday.
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Bill Clinton announced that next month’s Clinton Global Initiative meeting in NY will be the final gathering.
