Former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has blamed her election loss to her campaign mistakes and current President Donald Trump.
Clinton in an interview at a Women for Women event in New York, fingered Trumpโs tweets and his repeated comments about the election while saying she was on her way to winning the election if not for a last-minute letter to Congress from FBI Director James Comey and the release of campaign emails from WikiLeaks.
She took questions from CNN anchor Christiane Amanpour in the event hosted by Women for Women International, an organisation that works for equality and higher standards of living for women in war-torn countries around the world.
The former secretary of state said she thinks she would have won the election if not for two major events during the home stretch of the campaign.
โI was on the way to winning until a combination of Jim Comeyโs letter on Oct. 28 and Russian WikiLeaks raised doubts in the minds of people who were inclined to vote for me but got scared off,โ Clinton said.
โAnd the evidence for that intervening event is I think compelling, persuasive, and so we overcame a lot in the campaign.โ
Clinton said the Trump campaign โquite coordinated with the goalsโ of Russian President Vladimir Putin in the election, adding that Putin โcertainly interfered in our election โ to hurt me and help my opponent.โ
When asked whether misogyny was also to blame for her election loss, she replied, โI do think it played a role.โ
Clinton said she also took some responsibility for losing the 2016 election. โI take absolute personal responsibility,โ she said. โI was the candidate. I was the person who was on the ballot.โ
She added, โI am writing a book and itโs a painful process, reliving the campaign.
โShe said she was โvery aware of the challenges, the problems, the shortfalls that we had.โ Did her campaign make mistakes? โOf course,โ she said.
Clinton told supporters in attendance that Trump โshould worry less about the election and my winning the popular vote,โ adding, โI did more than 3 million votes than my opponent.โ
She also jabbed Trump over his strategy on North Korea and negotiating with its leader, Kim Jong-un.
โThe [talks] have to be part of a broader strategy, not just thrown out on a tweet that hey, letโs get together and see if we canโt get along,โ she said.
Clinton won the popular vote by roughly 2 percentage points, but lost the electoral vote.
The interview didnโt sound like one from a politician who was done being in the spotlight, raising questions from pundits about whether she is leaving the door open to a third presidential run in 2020.
โIโm now back to being an activist citizen and part of the resistance,โ Clinton said to cheers from the audience.
She also chimed in on current policy issues, such as Chinaโs role in clean energy development, the North Korean crisis, the Syrian airstrikes and womenโs issues.
โI canโt be anything other than who I am.
โI spent decades learning about what it would take to move our country forward,โ she said, touting her experience and deep grasp of complicated policy issues at multiple points in the interview.
She also pushed the importance of a comprehensive strategy in economic policy โ calling it a โboring word.โ
Source: ABC NEWS
