The New York Times editorial board late Sunday accused Hillary Clinton of dodging a question on whether Wall Street money would influence her policy decisions as president, and for offering the “cynical” response that those donations poured in because she represented New York during 9/11.
“Her effort to tug on Americans’ heartstrings instead of explaining her Wall Street ties — on a day that the scars of 9/11 were exposed anew — was at best botched rhetoric,” the New York Times wrote on Monday morning. “At worst it was the type of cynical move that Mrs. Clinton would have condemned in Republicans.”
During the second Democratic debate Saturday night, Sen. Bernie Sanders said donations from Wall Street, oil and coal, and other big industries would influence candidates. Clinton rejected that line, which seemed to be aimed at her, but defended her donations by making a seemingly nonsensical links between her female donors, the terrorist attacks Manhattan and the economic good produced on Wall Street.
“Predictably, Twitter exploded with demands to know what campaign donations from big banks had to do with New York’s recovery from 9/11,” the New York Times wrote. “Answer: little to nothing.”
During the debate, Clinton’s logic was questioned by people on Twitter, and she was asked to respond to a tweet that said, “I’ve never seen a candidate invoke 9/11 to justify millions of Wall Street donations until now.” Clinton struggled the defend her prior comment, telling the audience, “I’m sorry.”
The Clinton’s post-9/11 Wall Street ties run deep. According to the Times, since 2001 she and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have earned more than $125 million for speeches, many of which were made before wealthy financial groups. This number does not account for any donations given directly to her campaign. While most of these speeches were held behind closed doors 15 years after the attacks, “one can guess that she and the financial executives were not still talking about 9/11,” the Times wrote.
As a solution, the left-leaning editorial board suggested that “[Clinton] should make a fast, thorough effort to explain herself by providing a detailed plan for how she would promote measures protecting middle-class Americans from another financial crisis.”
