Andrea Mitchell said Wednesday on MSNBC that Hillary Clinton is "drawing a conspiracy theory" without evidence involving Donald Trump campaign officials and Russian interference in the 2016 campaign.
Clinton appeared Wednesday at Recode's Code Conference in California, where she again went over what she felt were the reasons for her election defeat.
Clinton blamed, along with former FBI Director James Comey, sexism, and poor data from the Democratic National Committee, the documented Russian effort to undermine her campaign that she said was "guided by Americans."
At one point, she discussed the "fake news" campaign enacted by Russian hackers and suggested there was a coordinated effort involving Trump campaign officials Steve Brannon, Kellyanne Conway and the Republican National Committee's data operation to push false stories.
"She's basically pointing to the Trump campaign, saying that the dots are now being connected in the investigation," Mitchell said on "The Rachel Maddow Show." "She mentioned Jared Kushner, she mentioned Bannon and Kellyanne Conway in the context of the fact that the Mercers, the big fundraisers who contribute to the campaign and owned Cambridge Analytica, had said to Trump, 'Bring on Bannon from Breitbart, bring on Kellyanne Conway,' who are already on their payroll, as part of the deal.
"And that they connected with the data bank and the RNC. So she's drawing a conspiracy theory. She doesn't have the evidence, but she is obviously hoping that this is what Robert Mueller and what the congressional committees can do."
Mitchell added Clinton was not blaming herself. The NBC reporter did a scathing segment on Clinton last month when the candidate also cast blame on her loss away from herself; Mitchell pointed out Clinton did not mention her own failure to visit blue states that Trump flipped to red.