New stolen emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta, provide more evidence of the media’s soft touch when it comes to covering Clinton, and willingness to send advance stories or even be told not to write stories.
In one email from AP reporter Eric Tucker, Tucker said he was told that the FBI had a thumb drive from Clinton’s team. But Tucker seemed to offer to ignore the story if Clinton’s camp could provide a rationale.
“This is what we have been informed, and we wanted to see whether there was any sort of comment that could be provided,” Tucker wrote. “If you wanted to steer us away and say that we are misinformed, then I would gladly accept that as well.”
David Kendall of Williams & Connolly, a firm retained by Clinton, reacted by writing, “It’s getting out.”
Associated Press “journalist” Eric Tucker is willing to be ‘steered away’ from a story about Clinton’s emails: https://t.co/YHQTiw5HBj
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) November 3, 2016
In a separate email, Politico reporter Glenn Thrush forwarded eight paragraphs of a story to Clinton’s team. Those paragraphs were about communications director Jennifer Palmieri, and were ostensibly sent to make sure he had his facts correct.
But the graphs were generally a glowing review of Palmieri. They called her a “battle-tested communications operative” and riffed on the “soothing religious art” in her office.
They also said she had a “good relationship with reporters.”
Palmieri played down the complimentary passages and said “I hate” the section of the story that was about her. “Just didn’t want folks to think I went looking for this!” she wrote.
In another email released this month, Thrush could again be seen offering up sections of a story for Clinton’s team to check. In that email, Thrush said he was a “hack” for doing so.
Thrush told the Daily Caller that he was secretly working with Clinton’s team in order to prevent Clinton’s press people from “knowing I was talking directly to campaign officials.”
