a href="/myfiles/Images/2015/09/10/wr4_big.jpg" title="US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is seen on a screen as she speaks during a taping of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" in New York on Tuesday. — Reuters" US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is seen on a screen as she speaks during a taping of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" in New York on Tuesday. — Reuters
WASHINGTON — It took three interviews and five days for Hillary Rodham Clinton to say “I'm sorry.” After resisting apologizing for using a personal email account run on a private server to conduct government business as secretary of state, Clinton shifted course on Tuesday. “That was a mistake,” she said of her email practice. “I'm sorry about that. I take responsibility,” the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination said in an interview with ABC News. She reiterated the apology in a late-night note to voters on Facebook. Clinton's late-arriving mea culpa came just 24 hours after she insisted in an interview with The Associated Press she didn't need to apologize because “what I did was allowed.” That comment came after a sit-down with NBC News on Friday, in which Clinton said only that she was sorry if her actions had caused voters any confusion. The apology evolution is the latest chapter for an issue that has dogged Clinton's presidential campaign for months. Despite a big fundraising advantage and a slew of endorsements from party leaders, Clinton's standing with voters has slipped — multiple polls show a majority of Americans don't find her honest and trustworthy. After the shaky summer, Clinton's advisers say she'll more fully address the email saga as the campaign presses into the fall. Top campaign officials have started emailing memos to anxious supporters and convening late-night conference calls with prominent Democrats. Clinton's string of national interviews around the Labor Day holiday weekend was supposed to be part of that process — a signal that the candidate herself was on board with the idea of being more forthcoming. Or, as Clinton told AP, to take responsibility and “be as transparent as possible.” — AP
