MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski said Wednesday that Hillary Clinton’s interviews look "very tightly, tightly controlled" to avoid tough questions about her email scandal.
"[MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell felt that] if she didn't get to another topic, they were going to end the interview," Brzezinski said of her colleague’s interview with Clinton last week. "And it appears—I don't know what happened with ABC—it appears all these interviews are very tightly, tightly controlled."
Mitchell said Tuesday that she limited her questioning of Clinton’s emails because she feared the campaign would end the interview outright.
The Morning Joe panel agreed that Clinton had reason to fear tough questions about her email use. Host Joe Scarborough read aloud from a list of questions created by National Journal columnist Ron Fournier.
"Ron writes, you know by now that the State Department allowed use of home computers in 2009, but agency rules required they be secured. New regulations required your emails to be captured on department servers—you stashed yours on a homebrewed system until Congress found out. Why not admit you violated policy? Why do you keep misleading?" Scarborough read.
"Really, Mika, that sort of answers your question as to why she doesn't go on an interview that's not controlled," Scarborough said.
Clinton has gone on a media charm offensive recently in an effort to show more humor, heart, and spontaneity. She has given interviews to Mitchell, ABC’s David Muir, and comedian Ellen DeGeneres in the last week. She used these interviews to showcase a new, bathetic stage persona, at times cackling, dancing, and crying.
Looming over all these interviews is Clinton’s burgeoning email scandal, a crisis that her campaign is trying to stage-manage as it has spooked donors and voters alike.
On Tuesday, a special intelligence review conducted by the CIA and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency confirmed that Clinton’s private email server contained information about U.S. spy satellites that was deemed Top Secret at the time it was received. This contradicts Clinton’s earlier claim that her server contained no classified information.