An email made public by the State Department Thursday suggests a major Democratic donor may have had second thoughts about his decision to back then-Sen. Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic primary.
The email, which was released alongside thousands of pages of Clinton’s private emails, indicated billionaire activist George Soros had told a Clinton insider that he “regretted his decision in the primary” just as President Obama’s reelection campaign was heating up in 2012.
Neera Tanden, a longtime Clinton friend and president of the Center for American Progress, recounted to Clinton the scene from a dinner in May 2012 during which she had shared a table with Soros.
“I told him I worked for you in the primaries and he said he’s been impressed that he can always call/meet with you on an issue of policy,” Tanden wrote to Clinton.
Indeed, Clinton appears to have met with Soros personally in her State Department office just two months earlier, according to a schedule included in the new batch of records.
Tanden said Soros had complained of his lack of access to the president, telling her he had never actually met with Obama.
“He then said he regretted his decision in the primary – he likes to admit mistakes when he makes them and that was one of them,” Tanden said. “He then extolled his work with you from your time as First Lady on.”
Soros bundled for Obama’s campaigns in 2008 and 2012. This year, he has opened his checkbook to support Clinton’s presidential bid.
