Hillary Clinton has said that she takes "absolute personal responsibility" for her loss to Donald Trump in the 2016 election. However, speaking at an event in New York, she pointed to WikiLeaks and FBI director James Comey's involvement as being turning points in the race.
The former Democratic nominee was speaking with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour at the Women for Women event in New York on Tuesday, May 2 when she made the claims. “I take absolute personal responsibility,” The Guardian quotes Clinton as saying of the election loss. "I was the candidate, I was the person who was on the ballot. I am very aware of the challenges, the problems, the shortfalls that we had. It wasn’t a perfect campaign. There is no such thing,”
However, she went on to state that forces outside her control "scared off" voters. "I was on the way to winning, until a combination of Jim Comey’s letter on October 28 and Russian WikiLeaks raised doubts in the minds of people who were inclined to vote for me but got scared off.” Later in the conversation she said, “The evidence for that intervening event is, I think, compelling."
Asked whether misogyny also played a role in her defeat, Clinton said: “Yes, I do think it played a role. I think other things played a role, too.” Clinton added that misogyny was “very much a part of the landscape politically, socially and economically”.
Though quick to take personal responsibility for her loss, Clinton was keen to stress one other important election result. “Remember, I did win more than 3 million votes than my opponent,” she said.
See above for a short clip of Clinton speaking at the Women for Women event in New York.