Hillary Clinton’s Press Conference Didn’t Resolve Anything, So We’re Going to Keep Hearing About Emailgate

Hillary Clinton answers questions from reporters March 10, 2015 at the United Nations in New York. Clinton admitted Tuesday that she made a mistake in choosing for convenience not to use an official email account when she was secretary of state. But, in remarks to reporters after attending a United Nations event, she insisted that her email set-up had been properly secure and that she had turned over all professional communications to the State Department. AFP PHOTO/DON EMMERT (Photo credit should read DON EMMERT/AFP/Getty Images)
Photo: Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images

Hillary Clinton addressed the press for the first time since leaving the State Department on Tuesday. She answered questions about her email usage and mentioned her yoga routine, but mostly reminded America what we’re getting into in 2016 if she decides to run. If several news organizations live-blogged a press conference about her BlackBerry, what’s going to happen if she announces? But for all the frenzy, she didn’t seem to enjoy any success in putting the scandal to rest. The immediate reaction from the hundreds of political reporters watching the event online was that Clinton didn’t answer even half the questions that have been raised by her email scandal — although it would have been impossible for her to make everyone happy anyway, given that reporters have spent days thinking up new questions to ask about clintonemail.com, and people are already primed to be unimpressed by a controversy-induced press conference.

Unsurprisingly, Clinton began by mentioning the speech on women’s rights that she had just finished giving to the United Nation. She then commented on the letter sent by 47 Republican senators to Iran, arguing that the letter was “out-of-step” and that the senators must have sought to be “helpful to Iranians” or “harmful to the commander-in-chief,” either of which discredits those involved. 

Her transition to the main event was awkward, as she tried to shame everyone for caring more about her correspondence than Iran or women’s rights. “I would be pleased to talk more about this important matter,” Clinton said, “but I know there have been questions about my emails.”

Clinton said that she used her private email address instead of a government email because she thought “it would be easier to carry one device.”

Obviously,” she said, a tad ruefully, “it didn’t work out that way.”

At the time, it didn’t seem like an issue,” she said.

Clinton maintained that she never sent classified materials using her personal email, and sent all emails that could “possibly” be connected to her work to the State Department. She did not, she said, think it was necessary to send emails pertaining to Chelsea Clinton’s wedding, her yoga routines, or her mother’s funeral to the federal government for preservation. Citing those private emails, about 30,000 of which she had aides delete, she said she would not let an independent arbiter look over her emails. 

As Newton’s Fourth Law of Political Physics states, every announcement made by Hillary Clinton leads to an equal and overwhelmingly excessive reaction from the media, who rushed to the United Nations to get credentials after the press conference was announced. One reporter heard a security guard joke, “I think next year, we just won’t invite Hillary Clinton.” 

Press Salivates Over First Taste of Clinton 2016