During an appearance on Morning Joe on Tuesday, New York Times reporter Jeremy Peters eagerly spun on behalf of Hillary Clinton and the ongoing problems regarding her private e-mail server containing classified documents.
Peters stressed that Donald Trump’s presence in the race and his recent comments on immigration was “the reason why Hillary Clinton is resting a little bit easier while all of this controversy swirls around her e-mail.”
The New York Times reporter downplayed the impact that the FBI investigation into Clinton’s server would have in 2016 and maintained that Republicans talking about immigration will ease the fears within Hillary’s campaign:
It's because as soon as Republicans, Trump, Scott Walker, start talking about immigration, they start alienating the Hispanic vote and they start losing on the question, which the Clinton campaign is already posing to voters. Who cares about you most? Who is looking out for your interest most? And really that's what this election is about.
Later in the segment, Bloomberg Politics’ Mark Halperin continued to offer up a defense of Mrs. Clinton, specifically in regards to her upcoming testimony before the Benghazi committee. The Morning Joe regular insisted that he wouldn’t be surprised if the committee’s chair, Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy, doesn’t “get the hearing right. I didn’t say he would get it right and it wouldn’t come off as partisan.”
Halperin explained that Clinton’s strategy is “when there is a tension between the political and the legal, she and David Kendall, the Clinton's longtime attorney, always want to go with the legal, keep her out of legal jeopardy even when there is politics involved.”
Halperin went on to reiterate Peters’ line that “distractions like Trump” might ultimately help Clinton prevail in her upcoming congressional testimony:
She will just dig in and continue to spin the way she has been spinning and hope that they’re distractions like Trump, they’re things that come up that work in her favor, that she slays Trey Gowdy at the hearing and then she never has to apologize, never has to explain.
Halperin even went one step further and attempted to divert some of the responsibility away from Mrs. Clinton and onto the State Department as a whole over the issue of her server containing classified documents:
I'll say one more thing the State Department should be explaining some of this stuff. It’s the State Department’s obligation on questions of FOIA, on congressional subpoenas, they should be explaining.
See relevant transcript below.
MSNBC’s Morning Joe
August 18, 2015
JEREMY PETERS: Can I bring it back to where we started here this conversation, I know this will thrill everybody, but that’s with Donald Trump and the reason why Hillary Clinton is resting a little bit easier while all of this controversy swirls around her e-mail. It's because as soon as Republicans, Trump, Scott Walker, start talking about immigration, they start alienating the Hispanic vote and they start losing on the question, which the Clinton campaign is already posing to voters. Who cares about you most? Who is looking out for your interest most? And really that's what this election is about.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: But right now, Hillary is running against herself. Hillary's numbers are collapsing. You look at a recent national poll, Donald Trump is now within 5 points of Hillary Clinton. And whoever is sitting there, at the end of the day, this is political scar tissue that Hillary Clinton carries whether she runs against Scott Walker, Jeb Bush or Donald Trump. Go ahead Mark.
MARK HALPERIN: Two things, one, I agree with Al that Gowdy may not get the hearing right. I didn’t say he would get it right and it wouldn’t come off as partisan. That's their goal, though, they're well aware of the mistakes in the past. I've covered Hillary Clinton and controversy and scandal since 1992 and there are
three things I think at play here that explain her behavior. One is she hates when her privacy is violated and she's deathly terrified and she has been from the beginning, I think, that people are going to see her private e-mails and they'll will leaked. Second, when there is a tension between the political and the legal, she and David Kendall, the Clinton's longtime attorney, always want to go with the legal, keep her out of legal jeopardy even when there is politics involved.
And finally, you all talked earlier about she should apologize, the Clintons hate to apologize, they hate to show weakness. And that's why she will just dig in and continue to spin the way she has been spinning and hope that they’re distractions like Trump, they’re things that come up that work in her favor, that she slays Trey Gowdy at the hearing and then she never has to apologize, never has to explain. I'll say one more thing the State Department should be explaining some of this stuff. It’s the State Department’s obligation on questions of FOIA, on congressional subpoenas, they should be explaining.
