There is a great deal of evidence showing that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, defeated Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton said Saturday, but she's leaving it up to investigators to determine if President Donald Trump's campaign colluded with Russia to win the White House.
"I don't think we can reach that conclusion," Clinton told MSNBC's "AM Joy" host Joy Reid, when she asked her if she believed Trump's campaign colluded with Russians, Clinton said she does believe there are more facts being proven every day and there was an attempt by Trump's associates to hide their connections.
"There are lots of facts that are being proven every day, that there was certainly communication by email, phone, in person," Clinton, who was on the show promoting her new memoir, "What Happened," told Reid. "There was certainly an attempt by many of the Trump associates to hide the connections that they had with representatives of the Russian government and people close to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin. We know that Putin was intent upon helping Trump. That's no longer subject to debate."
Investigators are still finding evidence about what was going on, she continued, pointing out that there is evidence of interference with the election, up to and including Russian agents buying pro-Trump advertising on Facebook.
"I was so amused when Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., pointed out the Facebook ads were paid for with rubles," said Clinton. She also noted that the Democratic National Committee had items stolen through Russian intelligence efforts, with the materials migrating to Wikileaks.
"We know a lot, but I'm going to leave it to the investigators in both the Congress and the special counsel to actually come up with whatever legal conclusions," said Clinton.
Clinton on Saturday also said that had she been elected president, she would have looked hard at firing ousted FBI Director James Comey, as his actions went out of the grounds usually used by prosecutors.
"Much of what he did violated Department of Justice protocol," said Clinton, who has blamed Comey's statements on her use of a private email server just days before the general election for her loss. "You don't want people acting rashly, impulsively, or in this case, as some have suggested, under pressure for political purposes... You can be critical of what he did in the email investigation, but you can also be very critical of Trump deciding to fire him over the Russia investigation."
Clinton also told Reid that had she been elected as president, she would have sought an independent commission, with all authority needed concerning Russia, as its interference in American elections is not going to stop.
"Now we're hearing these bragging comments from Russian media persons, from Russian members of Parliament and their government saying, "Yeah, you know, we picked a president. We won an election,'" Clinton said. That should terrify every American. I don't care what party you are. Maybe it was me today. It could be somebody else tomorrow."
Clinton also accused Trump of having a "phony fraud commission" to look into the election, but the fraud it's trying to ferret out is nothing that "anybody besides the most rabid Republicans want to pursue in order to suppress even more votes, particularly African-Americans and young people so they can try to further pervert the electorate to elect their candidates."
The nation needs to look at voting machines and every state's secretary of State must get assistance to be sure their state's machines are not being hacked," she added.
"I know the Russians had a heavy thumb on the scale and I know it affected voters," said Clinton.
Clinton also wrote in her book that she wished President Barack Obama had warned Americans of Russian interference in the election while it was happening.
"He thought I was going to win," said Clinton. "He told me that the night before in Philadelphia... obviously, he was campaigning for me, but this is a national security issue."
She said she also thinks Obama was under pressure from Republicans.
"[Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell basically threatened the White House and the Democratic leadership in the Congress, warning that 'If you go public with the intelligence we have been provided, we will call it partisan,'" said Clinton.
She wouldn't say if that made them complicit in the Russian meddling, but accused McConnell of acting in a partisan, not patriotic way.
"Sen. Harry Reid, who like everyone who was briefed on this intelligence, was really upset and tried to keep forcing Comey, because my other problem with Comey is he was perfectly happy to talk about a really dumb mistake I made with emails that became an even dumber scandal, but he wasn't willing to tell anybody, 'Oh, yeah, and we're investigating Trump and the Russians,'" said Clinton.