Hillary Clinton’s campaign team investigated claim that Russia was trying to POISON her through a handshake with Trump, new book claims
- Clinton team was alerted to ‘tip’ before third presidential debate with Clinton
- That contest featured Clinton calling Trump Putin’s ‘puppet’
- Husband of Sen. Dianne Feinstein passed on warning Russians might try to poison Clinton through handshake with Trump, Maggie Haberman writes
- Aides immediately poked holes in the idea
- But a top aide ‘checked it out’ according to the book, Confidence Man
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign got a bizarre warning about a potential Russian attempt to poison her during her third debate with Donald Trump – and her team reportedly looked into it.
The purported threat came in October 2016 from Richard Blum, the wealthy husband of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee, although its sourcing would later be revealed to be extremely thin, in a strange episode recounted in Maggie Haberman’s new book, Confidence Man. Blum died in February.
‘During preparations for the third debate, Hillary Clinton’s team was disrupted by a warning from the husband of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who said he had been told that Russians might try to poison Clinton through a handshake with Trump, to inflict a dramatic health episode during the debate,’ Haberman writes.
The husband of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.) passed on information about a warning the Russians might try to poison former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton during her third presidential debate with Donald Trump
The debate came amid an intense focus on Russia, following the hack of the DNC and just days after WikiLeaks started publishing emails hacked from Clinton’s campaign chair John Podesta. The debate itself included several jabs about Russia.
Trump fielded repeated questions during the campaign about connections between his advisors and Russia. He called for the U.S. and Russia to ‘get along,’ and would later fume at the origins of the Russia probe and the ‘dirty dossier’ funded in part by Clinton’s campaign.
During the third debate, Trump would say Putin ‘has no respect for her. He has no respect for our president,’ prompting Clinton to shoot back: ‘He’d rather have a puppet as president of the United States.’
Trump shot back at Clinton that ‘you’re the puppet!’ Then, he added: ‘She doesn’t like Putin because Putin has outsmarted her at every step of the way.’
It also followed a series of poisonings linked to Russia, including the poisoning of Sergei Skripal in Salisbury, England using a nerve agent in 2018.
But Clinton did not take the threat seriously, according to Haberman, in an episode recounted in the Washington Post.
Trump and Clinton clashed over Russia and Vladimir Putin during the debate, but the poison warning quickly fell apart
Russian President Vladimir Putin was under scrutiny at the time
Current White House chief of staff Ron Klain, who was advising Clinton, raised a strategy issue that severely undercut the warning: How could Trump poison Clinton without harming himself
The warning came two years after Sergei Skripal, a former Russian military intelligence officer, and his daughter were poisoned in Salisbury, England
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman’s book Confidence Man will hit shelves Oct. 4 – just one month before the 2022 midterms
Current White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, who was advising Clinton at the time, raised one serious objection: how Trump could poison Clinton in that scenario without harming himself?
The televised debate also took place in a highly secured venue jammed with Secret Service agents, audience members, and members of the media.
‘Her communications director, Jennifer Palmieri, took the prospect seriously enough to check it out; the warning turned out to be mere speculation from a historian with no knowledge of Russian plans,’ Haberman writes.
The episode is recounted in Haberman’s Trump book, which comes out Tuesday.
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