NEW YORK — In an exclusive interview, Linda Tripp, a former White House staffer whose workspace was located directly adjacent to Hillary Clinton’s second floor West Wing office, confirmed long-reported accounts of the former First Lady throwing hard objects at Bill Clinton.
Tripp further described what she characterized as Hillary Clinton’s significant temperament issues, including “endless screaming” and the constant use of profanity, as well as a general disdain for the U.S. electorate, the Armed Services and the honor and dignity of the institution of the American presidency, calling her public persona a “smoke and mirrors act.”
Tripp further stated that as early as the first days of the Bill Clinton administration there was already talk amongst senior staff about a future Hillary Clinton presidency, a position to which Hillary Clinton believed herself entitled.
Tripp spoke in an hour-long interview that aired on this reporter’s Sunday night talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio,” broadcast on New York’s AM 970 The Answer and NewsTalk 990 AM in Philadelphia.
Listen to Part One of the Linda Tripp interview:
The issue of temperament has become a central theme of this year’s presidential election, with both Clinton and Donald Trump constantly accusing each other of lacking the trait many voters find so necessary to serving as the nation’s highest executive.
Tripp said Clinton’s method of attacking Trump on temperament is “positively mind-boggling” for “those of us who did get a first-hand peek behind the Clinton curtain.”
Stated Tripp:
“The voting public will never see behind the Clinton mask. But if they could they would see what I saw behind closed doors all of those years ago. They’d see a completely different human being from the one presented to the voters. Because in Hillary they’d see a coarse, profane political operative. With no moral compass. And a complete willingness to manipulate the rule of law to her benefit. They would see a fearsome, paranoid individual with zero concern for the masses. She sees the voting block merely as a necessary evil to achieve her goals. She is a total impressive smoke and mirrors act.”
Listen to Part Two of the Linda Tripp interview:
Tripp revealed some of what she personally witnessed firsthand of Clinton’s temperament and the way she says White House staff feared the First Lady to the point of “cowering” in her presence.
“In the Clinton White House there was endless screaming,” she recalled. “Constant vulgar profanity on the part of both the President and the First Lady. And it’s hard for me to refer to her as the First Lady, frankly.
“You’ve heard all about the hurling of hard objects. All of that was true. But what you haven’t heard is the cowering of the White House staff in her presence. There was a contempt for the military. And this is a woman who believes she is entitled to be commander-in-chief. And that was very, very difficult for me. Having had a 20-year history with the military. And a deep, abiding respect for all the members of the Armed Services. She had a hatred of Republicans. And I have think we have seen that with her basket of deplorables (comments). Sometimes the truth just peaks out.”
Asked whether she actually saw Hillary throw hard objects at Bill Clinton, Tripp replied, “No, we just saw the result on the president’s face. Literally.”
She continued:
“I know that that sounds scandalous. And that sounds as though that couldn’t possibly be true. But 99% of the scandals are completely unbelievable to those who didn’t see behind the [Clinton] curtain. You know, it’s almost a piling on kind of a thing. Because most people in their average everyday lives, they are going to work; they are driving the kids to soccer; there is homework; there are bills to pay. They don’t pay as close attention as someone like myself might because they’re just too darn busy. And it sounds like what the Clintons constantly say. That it’s the partisan witch-hunt. That it’s the vast right-wing conspiracy. Everyone conspires against the Clintons. They take no ownership or accountability for all of the scandals they themselves created.
“But it’s completely understandable to me why most people would think that this can’t possibly be true. This is not the person we see debating. And she is a polished debater. You know this just can’t be true and yet it is.”
Listen to Part Three of the Linda Tripp interview:
“I just think that when you talk about temperament you have to at least consider how the past portends the future,” Tripp added.
The Clintons possessed no respect or honor for the office of the presidency, Tripp charged:
“I remember a senior adviser to President Bush. A nice guy. I am not going to name his name. But a very senior advisor who had said to a few of us one day that he pinched himself every single day that he entered the White House to go to work. And he said further if you don’t feel that way you don’t belong here. And it resonated because those of us who did feel that way thought, ‘Ah, it’s not just us. There is a reverence. There is an honor.’ A feeling of history that we are so fortunate to be a part of. Of course, none of that pertains to the Clintons.”
Hillary Clinton has in the past claimed numerous times that she was not yet decided on whether to run for president. One notorious example was Clinton’s response to why she took six-figure speaking fees from Goldman Sachs and other big Wall Street banks. “I wasn’t committed to running. I didn’t know whether I would or not,” Clinton said in February.
Tripp scoffed at the notion that Hillary was contemplating running for the presidency.
“Well, this is one of the funniest things because literally on my first day in the West Wing of the White House in January of 1993, right after the inauguration, there was a chant from various senior advisors to support staff of the president. And it was ‘Eight years for Bill. Eight years for Hill.’ In fact, some had started out with ‘Four years for Bill. Four years for Hill.’ And they were quickly corrected. But I didn’t know at that time that this runaway train was actually going to happen. Or worse, what it means for all of us today.
“And you know she had a plan to punch her ticket. And so to punch the ticket to get to the presidency you need to have a resume. And so the whole Senate thing was part of the plan.”
Tripp spoke generally of various ethical concerns during her time working in the West Wing:
“Both the Clintons operate from a position of ethical bankruptcy. And in doing so they have been stacking the deck for many years. They have ensured they are above the law, as we saw this year. So whether it was obstructing justice or hiding documents. You know the abusing and besmirching of women. Their patented strategy of personal destruction of those who would speak out against them. And perjury.
They have insulated themselves with total political power. And the accumulation of vast wealth. Those are hard things to go up against. So it’s worked well for them…
And there was always the commingling and the pay-for-play. And I mean from the smallest way to the largest way. There was the wholesale selling of the Lincoln bedroom. And rides on Air Force One. And money all the time. It was just very difficult for someone who had seen another White House operate in a way that one would expect a White House to operate.”
Listen to Part Four of the Linda Tripp interview:
Tripp is well-known for her role in the Monica Lewinsky scandal, documenting evidence of the young intern’s relationship with Bill Clinton and submitting the documentation to independent counsel Kenneth Starr, leading to the public disclosure of the affair.
However, many people may be surprised to learn of Tripp’s larger role in the West Wing, and her firsthand experiences behind the curtain of the Clinton scandal machine.
Tripp was brought to the Clinton administration from the George H.W. Bush White House, where she served as executive assistant to the deputy chief of staff to the president, a role that enabled her to become familiar with the inner workings of the West Wing.
During the Clinton administration, she first served as support staff to the Immediate Office of the President, where she sat just outside Bill Clinton’s Oval Office. After three months, Deputy White House Counsel Vince Foster asked Tripp to work for the White House Counsel’s office as executive assistant to White House Counsel Bernie Nussbaum, who played a lead role in defending the Clintons in their infamous scandals.
Last week, Breitbart News reported on the first part of Clinton’s interview on “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio,” in which she discussed some of the most infamous scandals to rock the Bill Clinton White House.
Tripp possesses insider information on the scandals known as Travelgate, Filegate and Whitewater, and she personally witnessed the handling of documents from Vince Foster’s office the morning after he was found dead in an apparent suicide. Foster was heavily involved in defending the Clintons in the Travelgate, Filegate and Whitewater cases. Tripp was the last person known to have spoken to Foster before his death.
During the first portion of our interview, Tripp reopened each of those scandals – Travelgate, Filegate, Whitewater and the issues surrounding Vince Foster’s death – and she used her unique vantage point to explain how the notorious cases foreshadowed many of the current Clinton controversies, from the Clinton Foundation to Hillary Clinton’s private email server troubles.
Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio.” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook.
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