When Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) suggested during Saturday’s Democratic debate that Hillary Clinton is indebted to Wall Street campaign donors, the former secretary of state responded by invoking her time as a senator helping Manhattan rebuild after 9/11.
When Clinton was asked how she will show that she will not cave to the demands of Wall street donors, she noted that she has proposed an “aggressive plan to reign in Wall Street.”
Sanders then said that Clinton’s answer was “not good enough.”
“I have never heard a candidate — never — who has received huge amounts of money from oil, from coal, from Wall Street, from military-industrial complex, not one candidate says, ‘Oh these campaign contributions will not influence me. I’m going to be independent,'” Sanders said. “Well, why do they make millions of dollars of campaign contributions? They expect to get something. Everybody knows that.”
Clinton jumped in to defend herself.
“He has basically used his answer to impugn my integrity, let’s be frank here,” she said of Sanders before citing her work in New York after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
“I represented New York, and I represented New York on 9/11 when we were attacked. Where were we attacked? We were attacked in downtime Manhattan where Wall Street is. I did spend a whole lot of time and effort helping them rebuild,” she said.
The CBS moderators later returned to Clinton’s answer, citing a tweet during the debate from a University of Iowa law professor that reads, “Have never seen a candidate invoke 9/11 to justify millions of Wall Street donations. Until now.” Clinton was asked how her work after 9/11 was related to campaign donations.
Have never seen a candidate invoke 9/11 to justify millions of Wall Street donations. Until now. @HillaryClinton #DemDebate
— Andy Grewal (@AndyGrewal) November 15, 2015
“I worked closely with New Yorkers after 9/11 for my entire term to rebuild. So, yes, I did know people,” Clinton responded. “I’ve had a lot of folks give me donations from all kinds of backgrounds say, ‘I don’t agree with you on everything, but I like what you do. I like how you stand up. I’m going to support you.’ And I think that is absolutely appropriate.”
Watch part of the exchange between Sanders and Clinton:
I thought the line about the majority of her donors being women was effective, but the attempt to say that the reason for her Wall Street donations were because of 9/11 came off as, at best implausible and evasive, and frankly kind of bizarre.
Her comment wasn’t well thought out, but all she was saying is that she was the Senator for New York, where Wall Street is, so people who work on Wall Street were her constituents, and she worked hard to benefit those constituents, as all Senators do. It follows, as she noted, that she became well known to those Wall Streeters, so they do donate to her as a result.
Never ever invoke the specter of 9/11 unless the question directly addresses that horrid day. It reminds us all too much of the ghouls of the GOP who used the dead of 9/11 to further their neocon agenda. Let us not mimic Rudy “a noun, a verb, and 9/11” Giuliani.
Sure, and if anyone wants to believe that that’s the only reason, or even the main reason, why Wall Street has been and continues to be so generous to her…well, they are welcome to believe that. But I don’t think most Americans are anywhere near that naive about the role big money plays in politics.
While I’m happy Sen. Sanders brought up the issue because it is an important point–one to be watched–I also feel that Clinton’s point about representing NY at that time, it makes sense that many on Wall Street (NYC) would give her campaign dollars. First off, Hillary is very centrist and faces right when it comes to money and regulations–two issues near and dear to Wall Streeters. Her tenure in the Senate would very likely never be anything close to anti-Wall Street, etc. Almost all big corporations and such give at least nominal amounts to BOTH campaigns in these types of races. To flesh out this issue better, it might be good to research how much Wall Street, overall–and Hillary donors, in particular–gave to each of the nominees in those races. I’m betting Hillary’s Republican opponent fared quite well, too.
All of that said, I do feel that it is likely that Hillary Clinton DID make a lot of new friends and supporters from some who may have been tepid or non-supporters of her before, because of her representation of NY citizens and corporations. I hope she doesn’t harp on the issue–because that would be crass and just wrong–but I really do find it plausible and very likely that she garnered a decent amount of respect from those she represented during that time. Also, Wall Street did exceedingly well during the first Clinton’s presidency – and that good will, etc., was likely to spill over some.
Again, I’m glad Sen. Sanders brought the issue up. It is totally fair and one she should be prepared to answer–like all of them.