LAS VEGAS — Donald Trump is pointing to a stream of hacked emails as proof that Hillary Clinton would be a compromised president, but a surprising number of progressives are drawing similar conclusions — albeit for totally different reasons.
Some of the left’s most influential voices and groups are taking offense at the way they and their causes were discussed behind their backs by Clinton and some of her closest advisers in the emails, which swipe liberal heroes and causes as “puritanical,†“pompousâ€, “naiveâ€, “radical†and “dumb,†calling some “freaks,†who need to “get a life.â€
There are more than personal feelings and relationships at stake, though.
If polls hold and Clinton wins the presidency, she will need the support of the professional left to offset what’s expected to be vociferous Republican opposition to her legislative proposals and appointments.
But among progressive operatives, goodwill for Clinton — and confidence in key advisers featured in the emails including John Podesta, Neera Tanden and Jake Sullivan — is eroding as WikiLeaks continues to release a daily stream of thousands of emails hacked from Podesta’s Gmail account that is expected to continue until Election Day.
Liberal groups and activists are assembling opposition research-style dossiers of the most dismissive comments in the WikiLeaks emails about icons of their movement like Clinton’s Democratic primary rival Bernie Sanders, and their stances on trade, Wall Street reform, energy and climate change. And some liberal activists are vowing to use the email fodder to oppose Clinton policy proposals or appointments deemed insufficiently progressive.
"We were already kind of suspicious of where Hillary’s instincts were, but now we see that she is who we thought she was,†said one influential liberal Democratic operative. “The honeymoon is going to be tight and small and maybe nonexistent,†the operative said.
The emails, which also show Clinton praising Wall Street in a manner that’s discordant with her tough campaign rhetoric, have made many progressives less inclined to give Clinton the benefit of the doubt on nominees with more centrist backgrounds or ties to Wall Street, said the operative. “Some of the first fights that she is going to be dealing with are going to be personnel fights like about who she’s going to pick for Treasury, Securities and Exchange Commission, Education and Labor, and for regulatory agencies like the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Federal Trade Commission. Progressives are going to be on guard.â€
The WikiLeaks revelations have not influenced the hierarchy around Clinton or her feelings about trusted advisers like Podesta, Sullivan and Tanden, according to a source close to the campaign. Podesta and Sullivan helped Clinton prep for Wednesday’s debate here and traveled aboard the campaign plane with her to the debate, while Tanden is still listed as a co-chair of Clinton’s transition team.
But it could pose a major problem for Clinton’s efforts to fill out a transition team and a prospective administration if Sullivan, Tanden, Podesta or other close advisers became widely seen on the left as unwilling to work in good faith with the Democratic Party’s left flank, which largely aligned behind Sanders during his bitter Democratic primary campaign against Clinton.
Sullivan, who was Clinton’s lead policy adviser at the State Department, is believed to be a candidate to become her National Security Adviser. And the WikiLeaks emails revealed that he also carried great influence in domestic policy debates, often taking a centrist tack that concerned liberals, including opining that Clinton’s “natural place is to the right†of Obama on surveillance.
Tanden, the president of the Clinton-allied think tank Center for American Progress, is one of four co-chairs of Clinton’s transition team, and was expected to serve as a top outside advocate for a prospective Clinton administration. In the emails, she describes herself as “a loyal soldier†who “would do whatever Hillary needs always,†and her criticisms of Clintons’ liberal critics are unsparing and occasionally intensely personal — including once calling some of her own CAP employees “crazy leftists†after they published a headline critical of Clinton.
Clinton communications director Jennifer Palmieri dodged a question on Tuesday about whether Podesta had apologized for calling Sanders a “doofus.†Instead, she declared “we're really grateful for all the support that Sen. Sanders has given us.â€
Palmieri said the Clinton campaign has not asked to review Podesta’s emails to determine what types of additional revelations might be forthcoming in the tens of thousands of emails WikiLeaks says it has yet to release. She suggested, though, that the campaign was not particularly worried.
“We’re not spending a lot of our own internal time doing that,†she said, accusing Russian intelligence of perpetrating the hack “to hurt her campaign.â€
The U.S. intelligence community has not officially declared the hack of Podesta to be the work of the Russian government, but it did blame Russia for an earlier hack of the Democratic National Committee. And The Wall Street Journal reported last week that the FBI suspects Russian intelligence agencies were behind the Podesta hack. The Russian government has denied any role.
The Clinton campaign has declined to comment on specific emails, saying it doesn’t want to authenticate them.
But spokesman Glen Caplin rejected any suggestion that the Clinton team is dismissive of liberal leaders or positions.
"Hillary Clinton's policy proposals are the most progressive of any Democratic Party nominee in history and she has continued to champion them long after the primary ended,†he said. “From holding Wall Street accountable, to ending mass incarceration, to raising the minimum wage, to combating climate change, to making the wealthy pay their fair share, she's worked with progressive allies to aggressively develop serious and thorough plans to make real change."
For RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of the National Nurses Union, though, the emails reveal the true feelings of Clinton’s team toward progressives and their causes, and suggest that if Clinton wins the White House, she won’t be on their side.
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Some of the left’s most influential voices and groups are taking offense at the way they and their causes were discussed behind their backs by Clinton and some of her closest advisers in the emails, which swipe liberal heroes and causes as “puritanical,†“pompousâ€, “naiveâ€, “radical†and “dumb,†calling some “freaks,†who need to “get a life.â€
There are more than personal feelings and relationships at stake, though.
If polls hold and Clinton wins the presidency, she will need the support of the professional left to offset what’s expected to be vociferous Republican opposition to her legislative proposals and appointments.
But among progressive operatives, goodwill for Clinton — and confidence in key advisers featured in the emails including John Podesta, Neera Tanden and Jake Sullivan — is eroding as WikiLeaks continues to release a daily stream of thousands of emails hacked from Podesta’s Gmail account that is expected to continue until Election Day.
Liberal groups and activists are assembling opposition research-style dossiers of the most dismissive comments in the WikiLeaks emails about icons of their movement like Clinton’s Democratic primary rival Bernie Sanders, and their stances on trade, Wall Street reform, energy and climate change. And some liberal activists are vowing to use the email fodder to oppose Clinton policy proposals or appointments deemed insufficiently progressive.
"We were already kind of suspicious of where Hillary’s instincts were, but now we see that she is who we thought she was,†said one influential liberal Democratic operative. “The honeymoon is going to be tight and small and maybe nonexistent,†the operative said.
The emails, which also show Clinton praising Wall Street in a manner that’s discordant with her tough campaign rhetoric, have made many progressives less inclined to give Clinton the benefit of the doubt on nominees with more centrist backgrounds or ties to Wall Street, said the operative. “Some of the first fights that she is going to be dealing with are going to be personnel fights like about who she’s going to pick for Treasury, Securities and Exchange Commission, Education and Labor, and for regulatory agencies like the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Federal Trade Commission. Progressives are going to be on guard.â€
The WikiLeaks revelations have not influenced the hierarchy around Clinton or her feelings about trusted advisers like Podesta, Sullivan and Tanden, according to a source close to the campaign. Podesta and Sullivan helped Clinton prep for Wednesday’s debate here and traveled aboard the campaign plane with her to the debate, while Tanden is still listed as a co-chair of Clinton’s transition team.
But it could pose a major problem for Clinton’s efforts to fill out a transition team and a prospective administration if Sullivan, Tanden, Podesta or other close advisers became widely seen on the left as unwilling to work in good faith with the Democratic Party’s left flank, which largely aligned behind Sanders during his bitter Democratic primary campaign against Clinton.
Sullivan, who was Clinton’s lead policy adviser at the State Department, is believed to be a candidate to become her National Security Adviser. And the WikiLeaks emails revealed that he also carried great influence in domestic policy debates, often taking a centrist tack that concerned liberals, including opining that Clinton’s “natural place is to the right†of Obama on surveillance.
Tanden, the president of the Clinton-allied think tank Center for American Progress, is one of four co-chairs of Clinton’s transition team, and was expected to serve as a top outside advocate for a prospective Clinton administration. In the emails, she describes herself as “a loyal soldier†who “would do whatever Hillary needs always,†and her criticisms of Clintons’ liberal critics are unsparing and occasionally intensely personal — including once calling some of her own CAP employees “crazy leftists†after they published a headline critical of Clinton.
Clinton communications director Jennifer Palmieri dodged a question on Tuesday about whether Podesta had apologized for calling Sanders a “doofus.†Instead, she declared “we're really grateful for all the support that Sen. Sanders has given us.â€
Palmieri said the Clinton campaign has not asked to review Podesta’s emails to determine what types of additional revelations might be forthcoming in the tens of thousands of emails WikiLeaks says it has yet to release. She suggested, though, that the campaign was not particularly worried.
“We’re not spending a lot of our own internal time doing that,†she said, accusing Russian intelligence of perpetrating the hack “to hurt her campaign.â€
The U.S. intelligence community has not officially declared the hack of Podesta to be the work of the Russian government, but it did blame Russia for an earlier hack of the Democratic National Committee. And The Wall Street Journal reported last week that the FBI suspects Russian intelligence agencies were behind the Podesta hack. The Russian government has denied any role.
The Clinton campaign has declined to comment on specific emails, saying it doesn’t want to authenticate them.
But spokesman Glen Caplin rejected any suggestion that the Clinton team is dismissive of liberal leaders or positions.
"Hillary Clinton's policy proposals are the most progressive of any Democratic Party nominee in history and she has continued to champion them long after the primary ended,†he said. “From holding Wall Street accountable, to ending mass incarceration, to raising the minimum wage, to combating climate change, to making the wealthy pay their fair share, she's worked with progressive allies to aggressively develop serious and thorough plans to make real change."
For RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of the National Nurses Union, though, the emails reveal the true feelings of Clinton’s team toward progressives and their causes, and suggest that if Clinton wins the White House, she won’t be on their side.
More at Link
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