During the Univision Democratic presidential debate Wednesday night, moderator Jorge Ramos asked candidate Hillary Clinton about her recent email scandal, and Clinton would not commit to dropping out of the race if she was indicted.
When asked if she were to be indicted for her recent email scandal, would that prompt her to drop out of the presidential race, she simply responded, "that's not going to happen. I'm not even answering that question."
Ramos said, "it seems that you issued one set of rules for yourself and a different set of rules for the rest of the State Department. Who specifically gave you permission to operate your email system as you did? Was it President Barack Obama? And would you drop out of the race if you were indicted?"
Clinton said that those were a lot of questions. She stated that she was going to give the same response that she's "been giving for many months."
Clinton said that what she did was not the best decision, even though it wasn't prohibited.
She then continued to explain that that her emails were retroactively classified and her predecessors did what she did, so she did not need to seek permission from anybody to do what she did.
"Here's the cut to the chase facts," she said, "I did not send or receive any emails marked classified at the time. What you're talking about is retroactive classification and the reason that happens is when somebody asks, or when you are asked, to make information public. I asked all my emails to be made public. Then, all the rest of the government gets to weigh in and some other parts of the government, we're not exactly sure who, has concluded that some of the emails should be now retroactively classified.
"They just said the same thing to former Secretary Colin Powell. They have said, ‘we're going to retroactively classify emails you sent personally.’ Now, I think he was right when he said, ‘this is an absurdity.’ And, I think that what we've got here is a case of over classification. I am not concerned about it. I am not worried about it. And no Democrat or American should be either."
After this answer, Ramos then asked, after one more clarification question about permission to do this, "if you get indicted, would you drop out?"
Clinton responded, "Oh for goodness– that is not going to happen. I'm not even answering that question."