Politics

Hillary Clinton: I Am a Real Person

BELIEVE ME

In her first Sunday interview of the 2016 campaign, Hillary Clinton defended her emails, talked Biden and Sanders, and talked the "real Hillary Clinton."

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CBS

Hillary Clinton is not worried about Joe Biden joining the presidential race, is not planning to go negative on Bernie–and that server everyone won’t stop talking about? Well, others had one too.

So went Clinton’s first Sunday show interview since joining the presidential race last May – during which, she still appeared unable to put the fracas over her private email server completely behind her, but wanted to reassure voters she is a "real person."

“I’m sorry that I made a choice that has raised all of these questions because I don’t like reading that people have questions about what I did and how I did it,” she told Face the Nation host John Dickerson. “I’m proud of the work we did at the State Department. “

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Clinton became momentarily flustered when Face the Nation host John Dickerson pressed her about why she thought it was ok to house her emails in a private server.

“This was done by prior government officials including …” she began, before Dickerson interrupted her.

“But not at this level not solely a server just for you,” he said.

Clinton, with a frustrated-looking smile, responded, “You know, look, it was done by others, let me just say, that yes when I did, it was allowed, it was above board and now I’m being as transparent as possible – more than anyone else ever has been.”

The server was turned over to the FBI in August.

The conversation turned to the presidential race on the Democratic side, easy, breezy Hillary was back.

Clinton said her campaign was not even prepping for a Biden run.

“This is such a personal decision and the vice president has to sort this out,” she said. “He’s been so open in talking about how difficult this time is for him and his family and he’s obviously considering what he wants to do including whether he wants to run.”

She urged everyone to give him the “space to decide” what’s best for him and the rest of the Biden family.

When the questions turned to Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders – who has pledged to lead a positive campaign – Clinton stopped short of saying she’d return the favor.

“Look, I want this to be about ideas and about policies. I know Bernie, I respect his enthusiastic and intense advocacy of his ideas,” said Clinton. “That’s what I want this campaign to be about and I hope people who support me respect that because this is a serious election.”

She then added the country would be best served by a Democrat who held similar “approaches and values” that Bill Clinton and Barack Obama practiced during their tenures.

See: Not a socialist.

“Can I mark that down as a yes, you’ll pledge not to [go negative on Sanders]?” Dickerson asked.

“I have no interest in doing that.” Clinton answered.

Finally, came the ‘end of the interview fun question’ in which Dickerson asked for three words that represent “the real Hillary Clinton.”

She gave him about 50.

After a not quite hysteric, but not-quite-not-normal sounding peel of laughter, Clinton said, “Just three! I can’t possibly do that!”

“I mean, look, I am a real person!” she continued. “With all the pluses and minuses that go along with being that and I’ve been in the public eye for so long that I think, it’s like the feature that you see in some magazines sometimes ‘real people actually go shopping’ you know?”