Clinton’s Closest Advisors Blast Huma For Derailing Campaign

For 20 years Huma Abedin faithfully served Hillary Clinton, starting as a White House intern straight out of college during Bill’s administration and rising to become her deputy chief of staff at the State Department (we can’t even begin to imagine the amazing things she’s witnessed).  In a New York Times Magazine article back in 2014, one Clinton aide described the relationship as an “amalgamation of adviser, best friend, confidante, and perhaps even surrogate daughter.”

But that all changed one fateful day in late October 2016 when a letter from FBI Director James Comey to Congress revealed that Huma’s carelessness had resulted in a re-opening of the Hillary email investigation.  Apparently the FBI took some issue with Huma backing up sensitive State Department records to the computer of her sexting-obsessed husband, and former NYC mayoral candidate, Anthony Weiner.

And while it’s still unclear how the relationship between Clinton and Abedin has evolved since Huma derailed the entire campaign and cost Hillary her life’s dream of absolute power, one thing is certain: Hillary’s closest advisors can’t stand her.  In fact, one such advisor recently told Vanity Fair bluntly that they “don’t give a shit about what happens to Huma to be honest with you.”

“Maybe I’m just pissed off, but I really don’t give a shit about what happens to Huma to be honest with you,” one close adviser to Hillary Clinton told me recently. He was irked, in particular, at Abedin’s seemingly superfluous breach of decorum during a post-election event. On the day after Hillary Clinton’s stunning loss to Donald Trump, this person said, Abedin appeared within the rope line while Clinton greeted her morose and woebegone supporters. “You’re staff, O.K.?” this adviser continued. “Staff is staff. You’re not a principal.”

According to the Vanity Fair account, former campaign advisors accused Huma of a growing to be overly obsessed with the celebrity of the campaign and sought to consolidate her power base with Hillary by blocking access to anyone outside the “tight-knit” inner circle.

But amid Clinton’s stunning post-election hangover, some inside the inner circle wonder if Abedin became overwhelmed by the attention, and shut too many people out. “She was enjoying the red carpet and enjoying the photo spreads much too much in my opinion,” one Clinton insider told me. “She enjoyed being a celebrity too much.” The close Clinton adviser elaborated that Abedin and the other tight-knit circle of people may have suffocated Clinton, preventing the campaign from taking in outside counsel. “The real anger is toward Hillary’s inner circle,” the Clinton insider told me. “They reinforced all the bad habits.” For instance, the suggestion had been made that Clinton should show her gregarious side, by, for instance, appearing more often on The View.

According to this person, however, the inner circle nixed that idea. It seemed, this person elaborated, that even minor suggestions about changing the narrative fell on deaf ears. “Right away,” this person continued, “it was either regarded as an intrusion or a naïve suggestion or maybe someone has an agenda. And so people just stopped bothering. Where in most presidential campaigns the circle grows broader and broader, hers grew smaller and smaller.”

And, after Huma disappeared from the campaign trail in the days following Comey’s letter, many speculated that even Hillary had turned her back on her closest confidant.  Meanwhile, instead of opening the “inner-circle” new ideas when they were needed the most, the campaign apparently drew even more closed off in order to “quarantine the so-called ‘night-stalkers’ – sycophants and hangers-on” that may have sought to fill Huma’s void.

In fact, according to Chozick, Clinton appeared to countermand those who suggested that Abedin should be relegated on behalf of the sexting antics of her spouse, the randy former congressman Anthony Weiner. Clinton, Chozick reported at the time, appeared more concerned with quarantining the so-called “night stalkers”—sycophants and hangers-on from her many decades in public life—who might try to re-exert their influence.

And while Hillary gets set to spend her last $100,000 worth of campaign money on a lavish party at the Plaza Hotel tomorrow night for her billionaire donors, all eyes will be watching to see if Huma will make an appearance.  Hopefully, for Huma’s sake, there are no balconies at the party.