By Amy Chozick

Hillary Clinton Says She Cannot Explain Why Previously Undisclosed Emails Turned Up

Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke at Moulton Elementary School in Des Moines last week. Charlie Neibergall/Associated Press
Hillary Rodham Clinton said on Sunday that she could not fully explain the discovery of a string of work emails sent from her personal account more than two months earlier than when she has said she began using that address as secretary of state. But she said she hoped that voters would look past what she called the “drip, drip, drip” of the furor over her emails.
“There was a transition period. You know, I wasn’t that focused on my email,” Mrs. Clinton said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” when asked about emails sent from her personal account in her first two months after taking office in January 2009. She had previously said she did not begin using a clintonemail.com address for State Department business until that March.
The State Department said on Friday that Mrs. Clinton had exchanged emails in late January and February 2009 with Gen. David H. Petraeus, then the commander of the United States Central Command.
Pressed to explain the discrepancy, Mrs. Clinton said it was beyond her technical understanding.
She said the clintonemail.com server had existed in the basement of her family’s home in Chappaqua, N.Y., for years before she added her account. “It apparently took a little time to do that. And so there was about a month where I didn’t have everything already on the server, and we went back, tried to, you know, recover whatever we could recover,” she said. “And I think it’s also fair to say that, you know, there are some things about this that I just can’t control.”
“I am by no means a technical expert,” she added. “I relied on people who were.”
The issue of whether Mrs. Clinton has been forthcoming about when she began using the personal account – hdr22@clintonemail.com – is only the latest email-related question to distract from her policy positions and message during her presidential campaign.
In the interview with Chuck Todd of NBC News, which the network allowed reporters to listen to before it was broadcast Sunday morning, Mrs. Clinton repeatedly recalled that New Yorkers had looked past the partisan scandals that had plagued her husband’s presidency in electing her to the Senate.
“The voters of New York, they overlooked all of that, and they looked at my record, and they looked at what I would do for them,” she said. “I was elected senator after going through years of this kind of back and forth. And it is, you know, it’s regrettable, but it’s part of the system.”
In an interview with CNN taped on Thursday, her husband, former President Bill Clinton, placed blame for the email controversy with Republicans who he said wanted to weaken Mrs. Clinton and on a political press corps that he said was uninterested in the substance of her policies.
But Mrs. Clinton called the subject “fair game.”
“I love my husband, and, you know, he does get upset when I am attacked,” she said. “Of course, I take responsibility. It was my choice. It was a mistake back when I did it.”
When Mr. Todd prefaced a question by saying he wanted to pose “an alternative explanation that has sort of been circulating,” Mrs. Clinton laughed. “Another conspiracy theory?” she interjected, repeating a line Mr. Todd had used at the outset of the interview.
The other possible explanation, he said, was that Mrs. Clinton had perhaps used a private server because she planned to run for president in 2016 and wanted to shield her correspondence from any potential congressional investigations or Freedom of Information Act requests.
“It’s totally ridiculous. That never crossed my mind,” she said.
Still, when Mr. Todd suggested that the cycle of allegations, explanations and further explanations by her campaign had “the feel of a drip, drip, drip” and asked if she could reassure Democrats “that there’s nothing else here,” Mrs. Clinton demurred.
“It is like a drip, drip, drip,” she said. “And that’s why I said there’s only so much that I can control.”
Mrs. Clinton repeatedly said she had handed over all work-related emails and had not been involved in her lawyers’ decisions about which emails met that definition. “I didn’t want to be looking over their shoulder. If they thought it was work-related, it would go to the State Department,” she said.
“That’s the limit of my knowledge. And I know I was a little sarcastic about it in one exchange with the press,” she said, alluding to an exchange last month with a Fox News reporter about whether her server had been wiped clean. “Sorry, guys, but you know, I’m not a technical expert.”
At one point, Mr. Todd played a montage of Mrs. Clinton shifting positions on various issues, including same-sex marriage, the Iraq war and the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which she came out against last week.
Asked if her positions had shifted out of political expediency, Mrs. Clinton said, “I don’t think it reflects how people who are thoughtful actually conduct their lives.”
She reiterated that she had hoped to express her opposition to Keystone earlier but had tried to give President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry time to make their views known first. “It was, frankly, uncomfortable to have so many people asking me and my saying, you know, I’m waiting and waiting and waiting, and it still hasn’t happened,” she said. “I don’t know when it will happen. It may have to happen when I’m president, I hope.”
She said she had evolved on same-sex marriage, just as many Americans had, including Mr. Obama, as she noted. “I was not raised to even imagine this, and I’m thrilled now that it’s the law of the land,” Mrs. Clinton said.
Asked whether Democratic primary voters had increasingly gravitated to Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont because of his long-time adherence to liberal policies, even when they were unpopular, Mrs. Clinton said, “He can speak for himself, and I certainly respect his views.”
“I can just tell you that I am not someone who, you know, stakes out a position and holds it regardless of the evidence, or regardless of the way that I perceive what’s happening in the world around me,” Mrs. Clinton said, adding: “That’s where the Republicans are.”
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By Jonathan Martin

Jeb Bush Readies Fund-Raising Push Ahead of Deadline

Jeb Bush spoke at a town hall meeting last Monday in Mason City, Iowa. Charlie Neibergall/Associated Press
Jeb Bush’s campaign has invited leading donors to its Miami
headquarters on Monday for a fundraising call-a-thon, part of a final
push to maximize their haul for this quarter ahead of the end-of-month finance deadline.
In an email to contributors, Bush finance director Heather Larrison
wrote that the donors could also make the calls from home if they were unable to come to Florida.
“We would appreciate all of our friends across the country dedicating
a few more hours before the end of the month to helping the mission,” wrote Ms. Larrison
Mr. Bush, who has been slipping in many polls, raised over $100
million for his “super PAC” in the first half of the year. But collecting contributions for the campaign, in which individuals are limited to giving $2,700 per-person, is far more difficult and Mr. Bush’s report will be closely watched for how much he has expanded his universe of both large and small donors.
He has dispatched family members to help with fundraising in recent
weeks, including his older brother, George W Bush, who raised money in two Texas cities last week.
The call-a-thons have become staples of presidential campaigns in
recent years, with officials offering rewards for donors who reach
certain goals. Bush donors who raise $50,000 this quarter have been
invited to a Houston gathering next month that will feature Mr. Bush
and both former Presidents Bush.
By Nicholas Confessore

Hillary Clinton’s Chief of Staff Authorized Job Change for Huma Abedin

Huma Abedin with Hillary Rodham Clinton in Zambia in 2011, when Mrs. Clinton was secretary of state.Pool photo by Susan Walsh
A document certifying a new employment position for one of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s senior aides at the State Department was signed by Mrs. Clinton’s then chief of staff, Cheryl D. Mills, according to a copy of the document provided to The New York Times on Sunday.
Last week, The Times and other news outlets reported that the document was signed by Mrs. Clinton personally, based on a copy that was obtained by a conservative watchdog group. On the document, Mrs. Clinton’s name was printed above the signature in a box intended for the aide’s supervisor, but the signature itself was redacted by the State Department, according to the group, Judicial Watch.
The document was part of a process undertaken in 2012 by which Mrs. Clinton’s then deputy chief of staff, Huma Abedin, began working simultaneously for the State Department, the Clinton family’s foundation, and the consulting firm Teneo. A Clinton aide on Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that the signature was that of Ms. Mills, and said that it was within Ms. Mills’ duties to sign such documents on behalf of Mrs. Clinton.
Ms. Abedin’s work for Teneo is under scrutiny by Republicans, who are reviewing whether it posed any conflicts of interest or whether Teneo clients received favorable treatment from State Department officials.
Mrs. Clinton’s aides have defended Ms. Abedin’s employment arrangement in the past as appropriate and have said that she complied with State Department rules. But they have declined to say what role Mrs. Clinton may have played in authorizing Ms. Abedin’s multiple roles.
By Michael Barbaro

Ben Carson Dodges Question on Muslim President Comment

Ben Carson at the Heritage Action Presidential  Forum in Greenville, S.C., this month. Sean Rayford/Getty Images
Ben Carson is riding a wave of frustration with politics as usual. But on Sunday he employed a time-honored tactic of those elected officials: dodging direct answers to specific questions.
Appearing on ABC’s “This Week,” Mr. Carson, a retired neurosurgeon whose popularity is surging in the Republican field, was asked if he stands by his controversial opinion that a Muslim should not be president of the United States.
“Well, first of all, you know, what I said is on a transcript and it’s there for anybody,” he replied, avoiding the question of whether he stood by the remark.
The host of the show, Martha Raddatz, interrupted: “I’m reading the transcript, Dr. Carson, that’s exactly what you said.”
In his original remark, made last Sunday on “Meet the Press” when he was asked about the relevance of a president’s faith, Mr. Carson said: “I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation. I absolutely would not agree with that.”
Ms. Raddatz tried a different line of questioning. Does Mr. Carson “assume that all Muslims embrace Sharia law?”
Mr. Carson preferred to pose his own question, which he then answered. “Well, let’s — what we should be talking about,” he said, “is Islam and the tenets of Islam and where do they come from?”
He added, “They come from Sharia. They come from the Quran. They come from, you know, the life works and examples of Muhammad. They come from the fatwas, which is the writings of scholars.”
Mr. Carson expanded on his interest in Islam. “What I would like for somebody to show me is an improved Islamic text that opposes Sharia. Let me see — if you can show me that, I will begin to alter my thinking on this.
“Right now, when you have something that is against the rights of women, against the rights of gays, subjugates other religions, and a host of things that are not compatible with our Constitution, why in fact would you take that chance?”
Ms. Raddatz moved on to a different topic.
By Michael Barbaro

Jeb Bush Opposes Shutdown Over Planned Parenthood Funding; Carly Fiorina Doesn’t

Carly Fiorina spoke at the Quad Cities New Ideas Forum at St. Ambrose University in Davenport, Iowa, on Friday. Scott Olson/Getty Images
Jeb Bush said he was opposed to a shutdown of the federal government proposed by some congressional Republicans in their fight to defund Planned Parenthood – a tactic that Carly Fiorina, one of his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination, suggested she could endorse.
Mr. Bush, the former Florida governor, called such a move wrongheaded and futile.
“I am against the government shutdown. That’s not how democracy works,” he said during an interview on “Fox News Sunday” with Chris Wallace. He said such a tactic would not succeed in stripping Planned Parenthood of federal funds under President Obama.
Mrs. Fiorina, appearing Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” sounded open to a shutdown, saying it would force Democrats to defend what she called “the butchery” of Planned Parenthood.
“If the president of the United States and Democrats are willing to stand up and defend this practice and shut down the government over it, then let them explain it to the American people,” she said.
Asked if she wanted a congressional showdown, Mrs. Fiorina said: “I believe there are a variety of ways to deal with this. But I believe this is something we must stand up and fight for. Because it is about the character of our nation.”
Mrs. Fiorina insisted that video footage she passionately described during the Republican debate on Sept. 16 – she said it showed a live fetus on a table as a Planned Parenthood worker sought to harvest its brain – “absolutely does exist,” despite the conclusion of many news organizations that it does not.
“Do you think this is not happening?” Mrs. Fiorina asked her interviewer, Chuck Todd of NBC News, when he said that “the footage you describe at best is a reenactment” and that “even the people that made the videos admit it’s stock footage.”
“No one can deny this is happening because it is happening,” Mrs. Fiorina insisted.
During his interview on Fox News, Mr. Bush defended his proposed tax cuts, which, according to an analysis cited by the show’s host, Chris Wallace, would generate far more savings for the wealthy than for the middle class.
“The simple fact,” Mr. Bush said, “is 1 percent of people pay 40 percent of all the taxes, so of course tax cuts for everyone is going to generate more for those who are paying a lot more.”
He added: “That’s just the way it is.”
Asked about his remark on Thursday that African-American voters wanted “hope,” not “free stuff” – a phrase that echoed a Mitt Romney critique of President Obama in 2012 – Mr. Bush repeated the phrase as he sought to explain it.
“Fixing a few big complex things will allow people to rise up,” he said. “That’s what people want. They don’t want free stuff.”
Mr. Bush’s remark on Thursday came in response to a question by a white man in South Carolina about how Mr. Bush would appeal to black voters.
“Our message is one of hope and aspiration,” Mr. Bush said then. “It isn’t one of division and get in line and we’ll take care of you with free stuff. Our message is one that is uplifting — that says you can achieve earned success.”
In 2012, Mr. Romney drew a wave of criticism, particularly from African-Americans who called his remarks offensive, when, shortly after he was booed at an N.A.A.C.P. event, he told voters that “your friends who like Obamacare, you remind them of this: If they want more stuff from government, tell them to go vote for the other guy — more free stuff. But don’t forget, nothing is really free.”