Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy for President on April 12, just over one month ago. Since then she has held meetings with hand selected Democrats but has only answered a total of 13 questions from the media. And frankly, some of those questions were softballs and some of Hillary’s answers were dodges.
The subject of Hillary’s media avoidance has become a story of its own this week. ABC News noted Tuesday that it has been 21 days since Hillary answered any question from the media. The Washington Post created a clock that counts the number of minutes since Hillary last answered a question (currently at 31,610).
Wednesday, NPR updated a list started by National Journal which tries to identify every single question Hillary has been asked. NPR’s list of 13 questions makes clear that several of the 13 questions were softballs, including question #2: “How are you liking Iowa?” and question #4: “Is it good to be back out here again?”
When a reporter does get in a more challenging question, Hillary often ducks. For instance, asked how she could win Iowa given her loss in 2008 (question #1), Hillary responded, “I’m having a great time.” And when asked about her campaign finance plan (question #7), Hillary replied, “We do have a plan. We have a plan for my plan.”
Hillary did have a good answer to a question about why she is running (question #3), saying she wanted “to be the champion to Americans and their families.” But when asked about accusations in the book Clinton Cash, she brushed it aside, saying, “we will be subjected to all kinds of distraction and attacks.” Given the lengthy reporting in the NY Times, the Washington Post, and elsewhere, that doesn’t seem to really cover it.
Speaking of distractions, about two weeks ago, in the midst of the Baltimore riots, Hillary exited a building talking loudly to no one. It looked like a pathetic attempt to avoid having to answer a question about a contentious topic from media waiting outside. The embarrassing Instagram clip published by ABC News’s Liz Kreutz probably deserves some more attention in light of the media’s recent interest in her press avoidance tactics.
A video posted by Liz Kreutz (@kreutzel) on Apr 28, 2015 at 2:29pm PDT
It has been a month and the media is already growing tired of this game. At some point, Hillary is going to have to take real questions and offer more than breezy, anodyne answers.