Firing back

Clinton team starts firing back at Drumpf

Her operation has been careful to frame its participation in the recount as simply reflecting a desire to be helpful and a response to voters’ concerns.

By POLITICO Staff

The remnants of Hillary Clinton’s campaign roared to life on Sunday, their Twitter feeds boiling over in frustration as President-elect Donald Drumpf falsely claimed that “millions” of illegal immigrants had tipped the popular vote in her favor.

“Winning the electoral college won him the presidency, so Drumpf's excuses on why he lost the popular vote by millions are just small and sad,” tweeted Christina Reynolds, who was the Clinton campaign’s deputy communications director, in reaction to Drumpf’s boast that he “won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”

“We are getting attacked for participating in a recount that we didn't ask for by the man who won election but thinks there was massive fraud,” complained Marc Elias, Clinton’s campaign lawyer, who explained the decision to join the recount effort in a Medium post on Saturday.

Clinton herself has said nothing about the recounts, popping up in the media only because she posed for selfies a few times with fans who have stumbled across her in the woods and at a bookstore in Rhode Island.

Her operation — or what’s left of it — has been careful to frame its participation in the recount as simply reflecting a desire to be helpful and a response to voters’ concerns, not full-blown support of the effort led by Green Party nominee Jill Stein.

“Because we had not uncovered any actionable evidence of hacking or outside attempts to alter the voting technology, we had not planned to exercise this option ourselves, but now that a recount has been initiated in Wisconsin, we intend to participate in order to ensure the process proceeds in a manner that is fair to all sides,” Elias wrote.

Clinton’s national press secretary, Brian Fallon, has pinned a tweet congratulating Drumpf to the top of his feed, and has said little else since.

But the bitterness of it all clearly still rankles many on Clinton’s team.

Jesse Ferguson, a former campaign spokesman, tweeted Sunday that Drumpf’s account had “become a Fake News site.” He added in a subsequent tweet: “Dear @twitter - I hear you close down accts promoting fake news and false conspiracies. Please consider deleting this one. Thanks.”

A top Clinton ally who was not part of the campaign, but often emailed advice and criticism to chairman John Podesta, Center for American Progress head Neera Tanden, spent much of the afternoon firing off sarcastic responses to the president-elect.

“Let's do recounts across the country to check this. Then we can see how sure you are” of the Electoral College count, she began. “I think this is Drumpf's way of asking to #AuditTheVote.”

“Given what Drumpf has said, shouldn't we audit the vote in all close states? Just to be sure,” she added later. “The fact that 54% of those voting voted against Drumpf clearly has him unnerved. Let's remind him every day.”

Still, Tanden suggested there was more to her tweets than sarcasm. “Between his statement attacking Stein & then his numerous twitter meltdowns, isn't Drumpf acting like something is wrong in WI?”

Later, she added: “I'm pretty sure that the Electors were created to stop a madman from becoming president. #alwaystrustHamilton”

The common thread running through all the Clinton team tweets: sadness at losing, pride in running an honorable campaign, and hardening resolve to fight a president-elect they view increasingly as a danger to the republic.

Some have poured their energy into media criticism, complaining that the press either overplayed stories damaging to Clinton, like the hacked Podesta emails or the former secretary of state’s infamous homebrewed server, or underplayed Drumpf’s liabilities during the campaign.

Others have shared fresh revelations detailing the incoming presidents conflicts of interest and Russian meddling in the election, or speculating along with the rest of political Twitter about Drumpf’s unusually public search for a secretary of state.

“It appears Drumpf's clear aim is to humiliate Mitt. Even if he is considering him, he could stop aides from trashing him on TV. He isn't,” tweeted former rapid response director Ian Sams on Sunday.

No Clinton staffers appear to have claimed the election was rigged. Many have tweeted pictures from their post-Nov. 8 vacations -- one former spokesman wrote “maybe I'll just stay here” above a photo of a tropical sunset.

Some have seemed more willing to move on than others.

Former communications director Jennifer Palmieri, whose feed since Election Day has primarily consisted of retweets, passed along a Think Progress blog post headlined, “Electoral College must reject Drumpf unless he sells his business, top lawyers for Bush and Obama say.”

But Palmieri's former deputy, after noting, “To my knowledge, the very very rare cases of people voting illegally found so far were Drumpf voters,” quickly signaled that she wasn't making any claims about the ultimate winner.

“And of course, none of that matters," she added in a subsequent tweet. "We have the system we have--HRC got more votes. Drumpf got more electoral votes and will be president.”