Donald Trump has been hammering Hillary Clinton for ties between Clinton at the State Department and the Clinton Foundation, calling for a special prosecutor to look into his "pay to play" allegations and calling the apparent access granted to Clinton Foundation donors "what happens in third-world countries." "It is impossible to figure out where the Clinton Foundation ends and the State Department begins," he said at a rally in Austin on Tuesday night. "It is now abundantly clear that the Clintons set up a business to profit from public office" — which would be one long con, since Clinton was appointed secretary of state nine years after the Foundation was launched.
But Trump himself has donated to the Clinton Foundation, giving between $100,000 and $250,000 as of 2014 — a point Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon noted:
CNN's Anderson Cooper asked Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway about those donations, asking if Trump was "paying to play" himself. "Hey, the Clinton Foundation does a lot of good work, and I also want to say that for the record, they do," she said. Cooper asked again if Trump was trying to buy access to Clinton, and Conway said "no, because it seemed like he had access to her anytime he wanted — I mean, she went to his wedding, they went to his wedding." The Clinton Foundation, she repeated, "does good work, and let's hope that that money went to good use." When pressed, Conway said that Trump "was not paying to play," and "he has never told me he's gone to the State Department to have a meeting with Hillary Clinton." Watch below. Peter Weber
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Nnela Kalu’s historic Turner Prize winTalking Point Glasgow-born artist is first person with a learning disability to win Britain’s biggest art prize
-
Bridget Riley: Learning to See – an ‘invigorating and magical ensemble’The Week Recommends The English artist’s striking paintings turn ‘concentration into reverie’
-
‘Stakeknife’: MI5’s man inside the IRAThe Explainer Freddie Scappaticci, implicated in 14 murders and 15 abductions during the Troubles, ‘probably cost more lives than he saved’, investigation claims
-
Judge orders release of Ghislaine Maxwell recordsSpeed Read The grand jury records from the 2019 prosecution of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein will be made public
-
Miami elects first Democratic mayor in 28 yearsSpeed Read Eileen Higgins, Miami’s first woman mayor, focused on affordability and Trump’s immigration crackdown in her campaign
-
Ex-FBI agents sue Patel over protest firingspeed read The former FBI agents were fired for kneeling during a 2020 racial justice protest for ‘apolitical tactical reasons’
-
Trump unveils $12B bailout for tariff-hit farmersSpeed Read The president continues to insist that his tariff policy is working
-
Trump’s Comey case dealt new setbackspeed read A federal judge ruled that key evidence could not be used in an effort to reindict former FBI Director James Comey
-
Moscow cheers Trump’s new ‘America First’ strategyspeed read The president’s national security strategy seeks ‘strategic stability’ with Russia
-
Trump tightens restrictions for work visasSpeed Read The length of work permits for asylum seekers and refugees has been shortened from five years to 18 months
-
Supreme Court revives Texas GOP gerrymanderSpeed Read Texas Republicans can use the congressional map they approved in August at President Donald Trump’s behest
