Hundreds of hacked emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman were published by WikiLeaks Friday — including messages with excerpts from Clinton's closed-door, six-figure paid speeches that were apparently flagged as potentially damaging, reports say.
The speech transcripts include quotes from Clinton about her distance from middle-class life — "I'm kind of far removed" — her vision of governing — "you need both a public and a private position" — and her views on trade, health care, and Wall Street — "even if it may not be 100 percent true, if the perception is that somehow the game is rigged," BuzzFeed News reported.
Campaign chair John Podesta is the latest target of hacks on key figures in Democratic politics and the political establishment — an effort Obama administration claim is an effort by Russia to undermine the U.S. election.
According to BuzzFeed News, Clinton research director Tony Carrk sent the excerpts in a Jan. 25, 2016, email to Podesta and other senior aides, about "the flags from HRC's paid speeches" to the Harry Walker Agency, which arranged dozens of her paid speech deals in early 2013.
The Intercept reported that Carrk highlighted in the memo the most politically damaging quotes from each paid speech, under headers including "Clinton Admits She Is Out Of Touch," "Clinton Says You Need To Have A Private And Public Position On Policy," and "Clinton Remarks Are Pro Keystone and Pro Trade."
For example, Politico reports, says at a Goldman Sachs-Black Rock event in 2014:
"My father loved to complain about big business and big government, but we had a solid middle class upbringing. We had good public schools. We had accessible health care. We had our little, you know, one-family house that, you know, he saved up his money, didn't believe in mortgages. So I lived that."
"And now, obviously, I'm kind of far removed because the life I've lived and the economic, you know, fortunes that my husband and I now enjoy, but I haven't forgotten it," she said.
The Intercept reported that at a speech for Morgan Stanley on April 18, 2013, Clinton praised the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction plan — which would reduce corporate tax rates while raising the Social Security age.
"But Simpson-Bowles — and I know you heard from Erskine earlier today — put forth the right framework," she said. "Namely, we have to restrain spending, we have to have adequate revenues, and we have to incentivize growth. It's a three-part formula."
Clinton also told a housing trade group in 2013 that on certain issues, she has "a public and a private position."
"If everybody's watching, you know, all of the back room discussions and the deals, you know, then people get a little nervous, to say the least," she said, the Intercept reported. "So, you need both a public and a private position."
Wikileaks, headed by Julian Assange, announced the emails include communications on nuclear energy and "media handling over donations to the Clinton Foundation from mining and nuclear interests" — and also contains correspondence with Clinton herself, Politico reported.
The data dump came just minutes after audio of Donald Trump's crude comments on sexually taking advantage of women was posted by the Washington Post.
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