A Politico reporter called himself a “hack” for sending paragraphs from his story to Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta ahead of the article’s publication, according to Podesta’s emails published by WikiLeaks.
“Can I send u a couple of grafs, OTR [off the record], to make sure I’m not fucking anything up?” Politico’s Glenn Thrush wrote in an April 2015 exchange with Podesta.
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Podesta consented, and apologized for a delay in responding.
“No worries,” Thrush replied. “Because I have become a hack I will send u the whole section that pertains to u.
“Please don’t share or tell anyone I did this. Tell me if I fucked up anything,” Thrush added.
“OTR: No problems here,” Podesta told Thrush about his story, which focused on Clinton’s fundraising strategy. The story appeared in Politico one day later, on May 1.
On Tuesday, Thrush took to Twitter to explain that he was asking for discretion because he was going around Clinton’s press shop by contacting Podesta directly.
I wasn’t supposed to talking to him w/o going thru press office MT @WriterJudd: why ask him not to tell anyone?
— Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) October 18, 2016
Thrush is the latest Politico reporter mentioned in recent document leaks. Clinton’s team referred to Politico reporter Maggie Haberman as someone who had “never disappointed” them in a January 2015 document obtained by The Intercept this month. Haberman moved to The New York Times shortly afterward.
