When it comes to her harsh words for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is standing by them.
Clinton sparked controversy when it was revealed earlier this week that in an upcoming documentary, “Hillary,” she claimed that “nobody likes” Sanders.
“He was in Congress for years. He had one senator support him. Nobody likes him, nobody wants to work with him, he got nothing done,” Clinton says in the documentary, adding, “He was a career politician. It’s all just baloney and I feel so bad that people got sucked into it.”
She then told The Hollywood Reporter that her view of the Vermont senator still stands.
Clinton hasn’t backed down on her comments as she also told the Los Angeles Times last week she “absolutely” stands by her remarks about Sanders, as the Times published the interview on Wednesday.
“It wasn’t just him, it was his major supporters, his online advocates,” she said of Sanders and his supporters, adding, “They were relentless, ruthless, in not just attacking me but people who supported me.”
“Some of the groups of women that formed, like Pantsuit Nation, to support me during the campaign were so barraged with vile attacks that they made themselves private groups. There was just something about what he not only motivated but accepted in how he talked about me, and how he allowed others to talk about me, that I found deeply offensive. And he seems to turn a blind eye, to approve, the same kind of behavior with respect to how other candidates, particularly women candidates, are being treated online by his rabid followers.”
Clinton continued to say that as for the 2020 Democratic presidential contenders, there seem to be “vitriolic [assaults]” on women candidates that “seems to be heavily tinged with sexism.”
“There was a common saying in 2016, where people would say, ‘Oh yeah, I’d vote for a woman, just not that woman. […] But the vitriolic assault on Kamala Harris, which came online, [and] Elizabeth Warren, seems to be heavily tinged with sexism. And even the press, which I thought would get better — and did, to some extent — still they fall back into the old stereotypes, which are very rooted in gender double standards.”
A few 2020 Democratic presidential hopefuls reacted to Clinton’s remarks and suggested that for her to “say that nobody likes Bernie does not seem like a very helpful message,” as IJR reported.
Sanders himself also responded as he told reporters, “On a good day, my wife likes me.” He added that Clinton is “entitled to her point of view.”
After sparking a lot of reactions, former secretary of state then said via Twitter on Tuesday that she “thought everyone wanted my authentic, unvarnished views.” She added that she would “do whatever I can” to support whoever becomes the 2020 Democratic nominee.
As for her upcoming documentary — which will appear on Hulu on March 6 — Clinton teased it last Friday and wrote in the tweet along with a video trailer, “I’ve got the kind of life you can’t make up,” as IJR previously reported.