Twice failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is back in the news — and her lies are finally catching up.
This time, Hillary’s far-left Russian fantasy could cost her where it hurts the Clinton family the most: in its pocketbook.
Just one day after Hillary forced her way into the 2020 Democratic presidential primary by bashing Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-V.T. as unlikable, she’s back in the headlines for an upcoming court case.
Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard filed a defamation lawsuit against Hillary on Wednesday over an interview in which Clinton falsely claimed Gabbard was “the favorite of the Russians.”
Gabbard, a Hawaii congresswoman, said in her lawsuit filed in federal court in Manhattan that Clinton’s comments in a podcast last year in which she suggested that Gabbard was being groomed by Russia to be a third-party candidate were based on either her own imagination or “extremely dubious conspiracy theories” that any reasonable person would know to be “inherently and objectively unreliable.”
During the Oct. 15 Democratic presidential debate, Gabbard criticized a TV commentator she said had called her “an asset of Russia.”
Gabbard is a moderate Democrat and a veteran of the U.S. armed forces. She’s seeking $50 million in damages from Hillary.
Without naming Gabbard, Clinton appeared to agree with the characterization during a podcast appearance days later on “Campaign HQ with David Plouffe.” Plouffe was campaign manager for President Barack Obama in 2008 and served as a senior adviser to the president.
“She’s the favorite of the Russians,” Clinton told Plouffe, who was campaign manager for future President Barack Obama in 2008, referring to a person she had earlier identified as a woman “who’s currently in the Democratic primary. … They have a bunch of sites and bots and other ways of supporting her so far.”
The lawsuit charges that Clinton “reserves a special hatred and animosity for Tulsi” because Gabbard endorsed Sen. Bernie Sanders over Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primary campaign and never endorsed Clinton.
“Clinton was extremely angry — to put it mildly — that Tulsi endorsed Senator Sanders over her,” the lawsuit said. Gabbard said representatives told her team in 2016 that Hillary “no longer trust[s] [Tulsi’s] judgment” and “that the Clinton team would never forget this slight.”
“One would expect someone of Mrs. Clinton’s political background to act with a greater level of maturity and dignity, but her personal hostility toward Rep. Gabbard apparently clouded Mrs. Clinton’s reason and blinded her to U.S. defamation laws,” Gabbard’s lawyer said in a statement.
Asked to comment on the lawsuit, Hillary spokesman Nick Merrill said, “That’s ridiculous.”
Gabbard, whose support among Democratic primary voters has averaged around 1% in polls, has said she will not run for president as a third-party candidate.
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The Associated Press contributed to this article