DURHAM, New Hampshire — Hillary Clinton struggled to answer a question on her Wall Street speaking fees one night and avoided defending them the next.
Asked Thursday night during MSNBC’s New Hampshire debate moderated by Chuck Todd and Rachel Maddow if she would release the transcripts of all her paid speeches, Clinton said she was open to the idea and would look into it.
RELATED: Clinton struggles to explain $600k in Wall Street speaking fees
“I can only repeat what is the fact. I spoke to a lot of different groups that had a lot of different issues,” she said, before pivoting quickly to her more general talking points about financial regulation.
After she stepped down as secretary of state, Clinton had a lucrative speaking career, giving paid appearances to universities, trade associations, and some major financial firms like Goldman Sachs, which paid her more than $600,000 for several speeches. Sanders has made an issue of the fees, alleging that Clinton is in the tank for the bank. Just one day earlier, at a town hall on CNN, Clinton made a more direct defense of the fees that was widely criticized. Why did she take the money? “Well, I don’t know. That’s what they offered, so,” she said. “You know every secretary of state that I know has done that.” Clinton has faced questions about the speaking fees for over a year, but still seems to have an unsatisfying answer.
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