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Stephanopoulos Calls Out Clinton for Backing Off Email Apology: 'How Do You Square Those Two Statements?'

January 31, 2016

ABC host and former Bill Clinton White House staffer George Stephanpoulos pressed his former boss' wife on Sunday about her seeming flip-flop on whether she was truly sorry for using an unsecured private email server as secretary of state.

After months of negative headlines and a decline in polls, Clinton told ABC World News Tonight anchor David Muir in September that the private server was a "mistake" and she was "sorry" for using it. However, during Monday's Iowa town hall on CNN, Clinton said she had not made an error in judgment and "nothing that I did was wrong."

"A few months back, you told my colleague David Muir it was a mistake to set up this private server, yet just this Monday you said there was no error in judgment," Stephanopoulos said. "How do you square those two statements?"

Clinton dodged, again resorting to claiming her server was legally allowable and that her only regret was that it was distracting from her campaign.

"Look, as I've said many times, it was permitted," Clinton said. "My predecessors had engaged in a similar practice. It was not the best choice. I wouldn't be here talking to you about it. I'd be talking about what people in Iowa are talking to me about, about affordable health care and jobs and rising wages and all of the concerns that are on their minds, and be really able to answer their questions as I have been now for so many months."