Acting Democratic Committee Chair Accused of Leaking Debate Material to Clinton

Drew Angerer/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — A new email posted Monday to Wikileaks claims acting Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile leaked a question to Hillary Clinton’s team the day before a primary debate between Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

“One of the questions directed to HRC tomorrow is from a woman with a rash,” Brazile purportedly wrote on March 5, 2016 to Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta and communications director ahead of the CNN debate in Flint, Michigan.

“Her family has lead poison and she will ask what, if anything, will Hillary do as president to help the ppl of Flint. Folks, I did a service project today. It’s so tragic. And what’s worse, some homes have not been tested and it’s important to encourage seniors to also get tested,” the body of the email continues.

She was not the acting DNC chair at the time, but she was a co-chair of the party and regular CNN contributor.

The next day, at the debate, Lee-Anne Walters asked the candidates, “My family, the city of Flint and the children in D.C. were poisoned by lead. Will you make a personal promise to me right now that, as president, in your first 100 days in office, you will make it a requirement that all public water systems must remove all lead service lines throughout the entire United States? And notification made to the citizens that have said service lines?”

Brazile was already under fire for a separate email leaked earlier this month that suggested she gave a question to the Clinton campaign ahead of a CNN town hall. On Oct. 11, 2016 after that first round of headlines about possible leaked questions, Brazile released a statement, denying ever sharing questions for the CNN Debates with the candidates.

“As it pertains to the CNN Debates, I never had access to questions and would never have shared them with the candidates if I did,” the statement said.

On Monday, however, CNN confirmed that it had formally accepted Brazile’s resignation, but denied that she had access to debate material.

“On October 14th, CNN accepted Donna Brazile’s resignation as a CNN contributor. (Her deal had previously been suspended in July when she became the interim head of the DNC.),” CNN Spokesperson Lauren Pratapas wrote. “CNN never gave Brazile access to any questions, prep material, attendee list, background information or meetings in advance of a town hall or debate. We are completely uncomfortable with what we have learned about her interactions with the Clinton campaign while she was a CNN contributor.”

Brazile tweeted an apparent goodbye note to CNN Monday morning as well:

Thank you @CNN. Honored to be a Democratic Strategist and commentator on the network. Godspeed to all my former colleagues.

— Donna Brazile (@donnabrazile) October 31, 2016

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