In Leaked Emails, Aides Were Candid About Clinton's Flaws

The Clinton WikiLeaks keep on coming: In the latest release of emails from hacked campaign chief John Podesta, Podesta and other Clinton aides complain about her reaction to the emerging furor over her private email server. In one message from April last year, Center for American Progress President Neera Tanden complains about how Clinton lawyer Cheryl Mills' fondness for secrecy led to the email mess, reports Politico. "This is a cheryl special," she writes. "This stuff is like her Achilles heal. [sic] Or kryptonite. she just can't say no to this s--t. Why didn't they get this stuff out like 18 months ago?" She goes on to say: "I guess I know the answer. They wanted to get away with it."

"We've taken on a lot of water that won't be easy to pump out of the boat," Podesta writes to Tanden in a September 2015 exchange, per the Washington Post. "Most of that has to do with terrible decisions made pre-campaign, but a lot has to do with her instincts." Tanden, who now runs Clinton's transition team, replies: "Almost no one knows better [than] me that her instincts can be terrible." In other emails, aides complained about her reluctance to apologize even after the FBI opened its investigation, though they also praised her strengths and hailed her successes, reports the Post, which notes that the leaked emails offer "an almost unprecedented historical archive" of a campaign's inner workings. (More Hillary Clinton stories.)