Former Michigan governor and Hillary Clinton surrogate Jennifer Granholm struggled Monday in an MSNBC interview to defend the Democratic front-runner’s financial ties to Wall Street.
The moment occurred shortly after Clinton, whose campaign has raised more than $4 million from Wall Street, and self-styled anti-big bank crusader Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., appeared together at a campaign event in Cincinnati.
MSNBC’s Tamron Hall began, “Listen, it’s one thing to get caught up in the moment of those two women walking out together … Sen. Warren talked a lot about Wall Street. You have some progressives who say, how can she support Hillary Clinton so passionately when we know that the Democratic nominee has been greatly associated with Wall Street from the speeches and other issues of trust that still exist?”
Granholm didn’t answer the question directly, and instead changed courses several times in her response.
“Well, clearly, anybody who looks at Hillary Clinton’s policy page, and I’m sure Elizabeth Warren has, and I’m sure Elizabeth Warren helped to inform it, would know that Hillary Clinton has got the most aggressive strategy to rein in Wall Street, to regulate the shadow banking system, to shore up what is known as the Volcker Rule, to help separate investment banks from commercial banks,” the former governor said.
Hillary and Bill Clinton have netted an estimated $153 million in speaking fees since 2001, with approximately $675,000 of that coming from what Goldman Sachs paid the current Democratic front-runner for just three speeches.
Hall continued, and noted that Warren has not always spoken highly of Clinton, especially when it comes to Wall Street.
“But she, I mean, that’s not true. I mean, she did represent Wall Street, but she also went to Wall Street to say, knock it off, you guys,” Granholm responded. “This right at the time of the foreclosure meltdown and the meltdown in the financial industry. She was right there saying we have got to stop this.”
“I disagree with the premise that those on the other side are making, that she’s somehow, you know, hand-in-glove with Wall Street,” she added
Granholm admitted later in the interview that much of the criticism for Clinton’s ties to Wall Street is coming from other Democrats and not just Republicans. Nevertheless, the former governor assured the MSNBC host that Clinton has a great plan to clean up Wall Street’s act.
“The point about her policies, what is in writing, in black and white, on her website, is which, that’s her promise, that’s what she’s said she will do. We know that she has got, in fact, economists have said, she has the toughest plan to regulate Wall Street,” she said.
“So that, I mean — having Elizabeth Warren there is really important to validate that she is going to be tough on Wall Street, and that she’s not going to allow a similar kind of crisis to occur,” she added.
