WikiLeaks released another round of hacked emails Tuesday, many of which had ties to Arizona Senator John McCain.
Leading up to the 2008 election, Hillary Clinton’s staff understandably mentions John McCain, the Republican nominee for president, time and time again throughout email conversations.
We dug through those files, and found a few of the most interesting ones.
WikiLeaks.orgOn January 3, 2008, a worker for a research and consulting firm named Greenberg Quinlan Rosner appears to have sent an email to several people, including John Podesta, with a draft of a questionnaire focused on John McCain. The questionnaire would be used to find out people’s opinions of McCain versus Hillary Clinton and then Senator Obama on a variety of topics before Clinton dropped out of the running.
The questionnaire script appears to target younger male voters first, asking the caller for the youngest male that’s home and over 18-years-old. If there wasn’t a male over 18, the caller would be asked for the youngest female over 18.
Another email that appears to be from Paul Begala, a former adviser for President Bill Clinton, details that he was at a restaurant watching negative campaign ads about McCain with someone, and was later asked about it by a reporter that was also at the restaurant. Begla calls the DC Examiner reporter right-winged.
I should have known better than to whip out the laptop in a restaurant, so I'm sorry about that,” Begla said in the email. “But there's no way for anyone to know whose ads they are, or whether they were even ads and not YouTube stuff. Needless to say I'm not returning the reporter's call.”
A third email acknowledges the fact that McCain will be the Republican nominee for president in 2008, and says that the Clinton campaign needs to start researching him “as soon as possible.”
Another discusses McCain’s efforts to win the state of Ohio in 2008, and discusses the Clinton campaign getting ready to spend “$1.5” on a campaign add to combat $400,000 that McCain’s team spent in the same area.
Clinton’s current Press Secretary Brian Fallon has been vocal on social media speaking out against the WikiLeak hack, and said that the only goal of the leaks is to draw attention away from Donald Trump.
Wouldn't it be good reading to see internal discussions abt Trump's taxes? Yes but Wikileaks isnt targeting Trump. That tells you something.
— Brian Fallon (@brianefallon) October 11, 2016
Clinton’s campaign has also said in the past that there is no way to tell whether or not the emails have been altered or edited before being released.
We’ve reached out to Senator McCain’s office for comment on the emails and are waiting to hear back.
