Though new questions regarding Hillary Clinton’s ties to the Clinton Foundation during her State Department tenure continue to crop up, some in media are saying it’s time to move on
These questions “really infuriate me,” longtime Clinton backer Paul Begala said Wednesday on CNN.
“This is politics at its worst and this is a completely new standard,” he said. “This is what the press and the Republicans do every time the Clintons run. There’s a different standard for the Clintons.”
“There’s not a single allegation of wrongdoing,” he stated flatly.
James Carville, who has worked in the past on multiple Clinton campaigns, said earlier this week that “someone is going to hell” for the attacks on the foundation.
“What the Clinton Foundation does, it takes money from rich people and gives it to poor people. Most people think that’s a pretty good idea,” Carville said on MSNBC.
“I think the foundation does an enormous amount of good,” he said.
The @VoxDotCom story on how AP's report on Hillary Clinton is a mess is itself a mess. Indulge me a minute here, as I think it's a bad omen.
— Proven Content Maker (@Bro_Pair) August 24, 2016
The Associated Press raised the foundation issue Tuesday by publishing a report showing that the majority of the non-government individuals who met with Clinton during her tenure at the State Department were Clinton Foundation donors.
Of the 154 non-government officials who met or had phone calls scheduled with Clinton when she worked the top spot at the State Department, approximately 85 either donated directly to the foundation or “pledged commitments to its international programs,” the AP reported, citing State Department calendars.
Those 85 donors contributed a combined total of $156 million to Clinton-owned entities.
“At least 40 donated more than $100,000 each, and 20 gave more than $1 million,” the AP noted. “Some of Clinton’s most influential visitors donated millions to the Clinton Foundation and to her and her husband’s political coffers.”
The Clinton camp disputed the story Tuesday, and accused the AP of relying on “utterly flawed data.”
Though the press’ overwhelming response to reports like the one from the AP has been to follow up with additional queries, there has been another type of response from media, which has been to question those investigating the foundation.
Vox.com’s Matt Yglesias, for example, published an article Wednesday, titled “The AP’s big expose on Hillary meeting with Clinton Foundation donors is a mess,” in which he stated the global newswire’s investigation “did not come up with anything.”
“There’s just nothing here. That’s the story. [The AP reporters] looked into it, and as best they can tell, [Clinton’s] clean,” he wrote.
One of his chief criticisms was that the story omitted necessary context from its social media promotion of the story, including that the 154 figure represents only the number of non-government people who met with Clinton at State ā not all of her meetings.
His analysis of the AP’s foundation report was shared widely on social media by several media personalities, including New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, MSNBC’s Joy Reid and Christopher Hayes, Poynter’s official Twitter account, CNN’s Dylan Byers and New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait, who called the AP’s investigation an “embarrassing journalism failure.”
Political commentator Alan Colmes also referred to the same report as a “hit job” and a “nothingburger,” and cited Yglesias’ analysis as proof. Talking Points Memo’s Josh Marshall meanwhile said on social media, “Matt Yglesias has this right. AP’s big Clinton FDN story is a joke. Much more of a joke than normal joke standards.”
However, there are many in media who remain unconvinced that the Vox editor had successfully debunked the AP report, including columnist Dan O’Sullivan, who wrote Wednesday that Ygelsias ignored several key points in the report.
The AP, for its part, rejected criticism of its investigation, and said in statement Wednesday it stood by its work.
“AP has been transparent in how it has reported this story,” said Vice President and Director of Media Relations Paul Colford.
“This reporting was done by the same AP investigative team that discovered Mrs. Clinton’s private email server and traced it to her basement in Chappaqua, New York, and whose reporting last week resulted in the resignation of Donald Trump’s top campaign strategist,” he added. “AP has been examining issues facing the presidential candidates and will continue to do so.”
Even as the AP and others continue to raise questions about Clinton’s conduct at State, some in media maintain uncritically that the foundation exists only to do good in this world, and that questions about its donors are crude and unwarranted.
“This is what the Clinton Foundation does. Yes, it’s so terrible to save lives and the environment. How dare they?” CUNY Graduate School of Journalism’s Jeff Jarvis complained on social media.
He opined elsewhere about the press’ treatment of Clinton, who has not held a press conference in more than 250 days, “Imagine the sā-show that a Clinton presser would be w/journos falling over themselves to show how tough they can be. Blame her for passing?”
Media Matters’ Eric Bohlert meanwhile quipped that the press’ investigation into the Clinton Foundation, “has been downgraded to How Aides Scheduled Meetings At St. Dept. #Zzzzzz.”
“‘Renewed questions.’ that’s what Clinton Foundation ‘scandal’ has been reduced to,” he wrote on social media.
Source: Washington Examiner
