The Hillary Clinton campaign on Tuesday launched its rapid-response website, which sets out to bash the controversial new book that’s questioned donations to her family foundation while she served as secretary of State.
{mosads}”The book is already being debunked far and wide,” Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon says of Clinton Cash, by Peter Schweizer, in a video posted on the site.
“It’s full of sloppy research and attacks pulled out of thin air with no actual evidence. And it’s missing the most important thing of all: facts.”
The new microsite specifically takes on allegations from the book, which was previewed in an April New York Times story, that Clinton signed off on a deal to sell uranium mines to a Russian nuclear agency in a move that financially benefitted a major donor to the foundation.
Fallon calls that one of the book’s “craziest conspiracy theories.” He said that the foundation donor had sold his stake in the company long before Clinton joined State, the decision was made by a group of agencies led by the Treasury Department, and Clinton never lobbied the government on the sale.
The video also criticizes Schweizer’s admission that he has no “direct evidence” that links Clinton to the claims in the book. It shows a number of television hosts pressing Schweizer on that point, and the video makes a specific point to note criticism from Fox News’s Chris Wallace by circling the Fox News logo on screen.
“The bottom line is this: as secretary of State, Hillary Clinton made decisions based on her commitment to protecting America’s national security and standing up for freedom and dignity around the world, not the interest of donors to the Clinton Foundation,” Fallon said.
He criticized Republicans for backing the book, and previously told The Hill that Schweizer’s book is part of a “coordinated Republican attack strategy.”
But Schweizer’s camp has parried those accusations and said that he’s investigated a number of GOP lawmakers during his career. Schweizer has said that despite any direct link, the pattern of actions in a number of circumstances he details in the book warrants further investigation.
The new site, dubbed “The Briefing,” is launching along with sister social media accounts to “serve as a hub that allows Hillary for America to cut through the partisan noise over the next 18 months and directly communicate with voters,” Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta said in a memo posted to the site.