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The former Democratic presidential candidate, a favorite villain of the right, has been featured prominently across Fox News' programming this week.

In many cases, instead of the network's hosts applying pressure to the current President, who is grappling with the fallout from a federal investigation related to Russian election meddling, Fox News' personalities have deflected and turned their attention to Clinton. On Tuesday night, for instance, Clinton found herself a key point of discussion throughout the network's primetime lineup.

"The new rule is any contact with Russia is contact with Vladimir Putin himself and therefore treason," Tucker Carlson said to a guest at the start of a segment. "What do you make of Hillary Clinton and her husband Bill Clinton's contact with the Russians while she was secretary of state?"

Such questions about Clinton continued into the next hour, with the co-hosts of "The Five" devoting a segment to discussing a Bloomberg poll which found Clinton's favorability rating lower than Trump's.

"POLL: TRUMP MORE POPULAR THAN CLINTON," blared the chyron on the bottom of the screen.

Not to be outdone, Sean Hannity, perhaps Trump's most devoted follower on cable news, hosted an entire segment dedicated to the "Clinton scandals." He asked Jay Sekulow, an attorney for Trump, how "damning" FBI documents about the agency's probe into Clinton's private server were.

Related: Fox News' Sean Hannity calls colleague Shep Smith 'so anti-Trump'

In total, Fox News devoted more than 23 minutes to discussing Clinton throughout primetime on Tuesday, according to data compiled by Media Matters, a liberal media watchdog -- an unusual amount, given that she does not occupy public office and is not currently running for one.

The fascination with Clinton continued on Wednesday. A "Fox & Friends" segment covered the same Bloomberg poll finding that Clinton's favorability rating was two points lower than Trump's. And in an interview with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein on "The Story," host Martha MacCallum asked, "Do you see any reason to re-open the investigation into Hillary Clinton's email and server?" (Fox News did back off of its Clinton coverage in primetime Wednesday as news of Sen. John McCain's cancer diagnosis and Trump's New York Times interview dominated coverage.)

The network's infatuation with Clinton hasn't been just limited to the airwaves either. Online, Clinton has found herself the subject of lead stories on the Fox News website this week.

"CLINTON'S SECRET? Hillary sided with Russia on sanctions as Bill pocketed $500G in Moscow," read a headline at the top of the network's website on Tuesday.

"RAIN, SLEET OR ELECTION TIME: Postal Service slapped for having workers boost Hillary Clinton," read another headline leading the website Wednesday.

The Clinton-centric news comes as Trump faces headlines unfavorable to him and his administration as the Russia investigation heats up and much of his agenda remains stalled in Congress. Donald Trump Jr. recently disclosed an email exchange from June 2016 in which he'd agreed to meet with someone he'd been told was a "Russian government attorney" about "very high level and sensitive information" that would "incriminate" Hillary Clinton. And on Tuesday, Senate Republicans conceded they did not have the votes necessary to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, President Barack Obama's landmark health care bill which the GOP had for years campaigned on repealing.

Brian Fallon, a spokesman for Clinton's 2016 campaign, told CNNMoney that Fox News' renewed focus on Clinton "shows how difficult it is to defend Trump's conduct on the merits."

"Fox is resorting to dredging up the ghost of Hillary Clinton, who is never running for office again," Fallon said.

Ted Newton, president of Gravity Strategic Communications, who worked on the George W. Bush and Mitt Romney campaigns, called Fox News' coverage of Clinton "absolutely ridiculous."

"I'm sure if there were good things to report, Fox would be all over it," Newton told CNNMoney. "And suddenly this deep Postal scandal would be on the back burner."

"It's certainly something that in the short term will continue to get them ratings," he added, "but that well is going to have to run dry at some point."

A Fox News spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

CNNMoney (New York) First published July 20, 2017: 6:38 PM ET

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Fox News turns to Hillary Clinton amid negative news for Trump - CNNMoney

Hillary Clinton's election loss can still be seen and felt across the country, just as if it were that same night in early November when millions were glued to their screens, witnessing a stunning moment of history in real time. Now, six months into a presidency that isn't hers, the former Democratic candidate continues battling criticisms from all sides of the nation, as if she were still on the ballot.

The right covers her flaws with tunnel vision, even as a failed candidatewith no tangible influence in policymaking or domestic affairs, focusing on Clinton while explosive new reports undermine the ethics of Donald Trumps White House. To this day, she is used as a scapegoat to avoid any real criticism of the president by conservative media: the same hour it was announced Donald Trump failed in rallying his party behind a landmark health care bill (unlike his predecessorin 2010), Fox News was pushing a conspiracy theory that she was instead the one guilty of collusion during the 2016 presidential election with the Ukrainiansnot the Russians, nor the Trump campaign.

Related:Hillary Clinton Is President in an Alternate Universe, Where America Is Great Again

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The most popular cable news network has steadily pushed fake news about Clinton in Trumps America. When she delivered a commencement speech at her alma matter, one of the first times she spoke in public since the election, the pundits were back to promoting false claims the 69-year-old grandmother was secretly terribly ill. Newscasters mocked her for sharing the pain she felt after losing the election, claiming she should "go back to the woods"where she belongs, and adding that she clearly never possessed the stamina to be president.

Hillary Clinton speaking during a event on climate change at Miami Dade College-Kendall Campus in Miami, Florida October 11, 2016. Timothy A. Clary, Getty

"She started the speech actually with a coughing fit that required them to bring her water and a lozenge,"Fox News contributor and former MTV Real World cast member Rachel Campos-Duffy said at the time. "So, quite the juxtaposition to how strong our president looked this week traveling, you know, all the way to the Middle East and Europe. After resting and drinking chardonnay, and cleaning her closets like she talked about in her speech you would presume shed be in better shape."

When John McCain shared that same pain with his supporters after losing to former President Barack Obama, telling an audience "after I lost, my friends, I slept like a babysleep two hours, wake up and cry,"he didnt experience the same pointed critiques by the left for appearing emotional or weak.

The rightwing medias unregulated progression into spreading fake news and misinformation is nothing new, especially when the target is a successful and highly-distinguished woman.But even Democrats and the leftwing media have railed on Clinton for having the audacity to remain apublic figure after losing to Trump, the same way McCain did, and Al Gore, and Mitt Romney, andvirtually every other candidate wholost a presidential election.

But Clinton's case is entirely unique, as no other woman in American politics has ever risen so far. She hasnt expressed a desire to serve in elected office since conceding to Trump, not even for a mayoral bid in her hometown of New York City. Whereas typical losing presidential candidates would often be invited back into politics by their own parties soon after their losses, the way McCain and others have like John Kerry, much of the far left wants nothing to do with Clinton. Even some of her own aides think her speaking out is bad for the country.

"She's apparently still really, really angry. I mean, we all are. The election was stolen from her, and that's how she feels,"one aide told The Hill following one of her first speeches after the election, in which Clinton described her battle to the White House. "But to go out there publicly again and again and talk about it? And then blame the DNC? It's not helpful to Democrats. It's not helpful to the country, and I don't think it's helpful to her."

Hillary Clinton leaving after a campaign rally in Sanford, Florida, on November 1, 2016. Jewel Samad, Getty

"How can we Move On Together if Hillary Clinton wont go away?"Boston Herald contributor Adriana Cohen wrote. "Hey, Hillary Clinton, shut the f--- up and go away already,"liberal columnist Gersh Kuntzmanwho voted for Clintonwrote in May.

And yet, despite all of the odds and obstacles against her, including a foreign adversary suspected to have influenced the election for her opponent, Clinton garnered the support of65,853,516 Americans; nearly three million more than Trump, and the most out of any losing candidate.She didnt break the glass ceiling on November 8, but herpersistentinfluence, and undeniable ability to remain one of the most important people in the United States, continues to chip away at it every day.

Those factors make Clinton, a former first lady, secretary of state and the first female candidate of a major party, America's biggest and most important loser yet.

See the article here:
Hillary Clinton is America's BiggestAnd Most ImportantLoser - Newsweek

(WASHINGTON) Hours before he was to help commission a new aircraft carrier at a patriotic ceremony on the Virginia coast, President Donald Trump fired off a volley of early morning tweets that again showed how furious he remains over multiple investigations into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

The tweets were unusual in their breadth and scope, even for Trump, given the wide variety of topics he touched on as Saturday dawned. His 10 tweets, all sent within two hours starting before 6:30 a.m., ranged from the Russia investigation and Attorney General Jeff Sessions to Hillary Clinton, the health care effort and his newly appointed White House communications director.

Trump said in one missive: "While all agree the U. S. President has the complete power to pardon, why think of that when only crime so far is LEAKS against us. FAKE NEWS."

The Washington Post recently reported that Trump has inquired about the authority he has as president to pardon aides, relatives or even himself in connection with the widening investigation into Russian interference in the election and whether any Trump associates were involved.

The president has long criticized leaks of information about the investigation and has urged authorities to prosecute leakers.

Trump maintains that no crimes have been committed.

One of Trump's attorneys, Jay Sekulow, said the president has not discussed the issue of pardons with his outside legal team.

Next week, Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.; his son-in-law and White House adviser, Jared Kushner; and Paul Manafort, a former campaign chairman, are scheduled to appear before Senate committees investigating Russian meddling.

Trump defended his son, saying he "openly gave his e-mails to the media & authorities whereas Crooked Hillary Clinton deleted (& acid washed) her 33,000 e-mails!" Trump's namesake has become a focus of the investigation after it was revealed that he, Kushner and Manafort met with Russian representatives at Trump Tower in June 2016. Trump Jr. later released email exchanges concerning the meeting on Twitter, after learning that The New York Times was about to publish them.

The FBI investigated Clinton for using a private email server as secretary of state. She turned thousands of emails over to the government, but deleted thousands of others that she said were personal or unrelated to her work as the nation's top diplomat.

Trump also complained Saturday about a Washington Post report that the Russian ambassador to the U.S. said he discussed election-related issues with Jeff Sessions when the men met during the 2016 presidential race. Sessions, now the attorney general, at the time was a U.S. senator and foreign policy adviser to Trump.

Trump tweeted: "A new INTELLIGENCE LEAK from the Amazon Washington Post,this time against A.G. Jeff Sessions.These illegal leaks, like Comey's, must stop!"

The Post on Friday cited anonymous U.S. officials who described U.S. intelligence intercepts of Ambassador Sergey Kislyak's descriptions of his meetings with Sessions.

The Justice Department said Sessions stands by his previous assertion that he never had conversations with Russian officials about any type of interference with the election.

Trump also said "Republican Senators must step up to the plate and, after 7 years, vote to Repeal and Replace" the Obama-era health care law. An effort to advance legislation collapsed in the Senate earlier this week after several Republicans said they wouldn't vote for the bill.

Trump ended the tweet with "Tax Reform and Infrastructure. WIN!"

Read this article:
President Trump Says Son 'Openly' Shared His Emails While Hillary Clinton 'Acid Washed' Hers - TIME

Fresno Bee

Clinton's generosity, service reflects her Christian faith Fresno Bee I support Hillary Clinton in calling out Donald Trump and his minions for embodying these deplorable characteristics. Now, let's consider Jesus' teaching about turning the other cheek. Clinton's response to those who continue to malign her: dignified ...

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Clinton's generosity, service reflects her Christian faith - Fresno Bee

There is a specter haunting the United States, or at least the Republican Party and its friendly news outlets. You may think its just a former government official who holds no office and wont be running for anything again, but they know the truth. America needs to get worried and, more important, angry at Hillary Clinton.

Oliver Darcy of CNN has been watching Fox News:

The former Democratic presidential candidate, a favorite villain of the right, has been featured prominently across Fox News programming this week.

In many cases, instead of the networks hosts applying pressure to the current President, who is grappling with the fallout from a federal investigation related to Russian election meddling, Fox News personalities have deflected and turned their attention to Clinton. On Tuesday night, for instance, Clinton found herself a key point of discussion throughout the networks primetime lineup.

It isnt just them. President Trump himself seems to be practically obsessed with Clinton, as Philip Bump explains:

Whatever Trump does or doesnt do, hes always willing to point out what Clinton did or didnt do thats worse.

So she comes up in his interviews a lot. In fact, in 19 interviews that hes conducted since becoming president, we found that Clinton tended to be mentioned much earlier than a number of Trumps other favorite topics: The 2016 election, the votes he received, the electoral college and Barack Obama.

In 17 of 19 of his interviews, Clinton came up, on average about 36 percent of the way in.

Without going back and checking, Im pretty sure Obama didnt bring up how he beat John McCain in 90 percent of the interviews he conducted during his first six months in office. I dont recall George W. Bush talking about Al Gore at all after he became president. So whats going on here?

For Trump personally, I think its mostly about the deep insecurity that comes through every time he opens his mouth. Its why hes always telling everyone how smart and knowledgeable and accomplished he is, something that people who are actually smart and knowledgeable and accomplished dont do. He feels a need to remind everyone that he won the election, usually embellishing the story by characterizing it as bigger and more emphatic a victory than it actually was. As his vanquished opponent, Clinton is a symbol of his potency and dominance.

The fact that Clinton got millions more votes than him is obviously a wound that wont stop hurting, so he keeps trying to convince everyone that the vote was fraudulent and that whatever hes being accused of, she did it worse. Eight months after the election, shes still the yardstick hes measuring himself against.

President Trump signed an executive order on May 11, initiating an investigation into voter suppression and election fraud. Here's what we know so far. (Patrick Martin/The Washington Post)

Trump also seems to bring up the campaign (and Clinton) so much because things were much clearer for him then. It was him against her in a contest that made sense, and he won. Now he has to spend his days worrying about policies he neither understands nor cares about, hes bedeviled by investigations, and he doesnt have the succor that comes from hearing the cheers of an adoring crowd every night. When he brings up Clinton, hes like an aging athlete reliving his glory days. Hey, did I ever tell you about the time I threw a touchdown pass to win the homecoming game? Yes, Uncle Don, only about a hundred times.

For the conservative media, theres a slightly different motivation at work. If youre Fox News or a conservative talk radio show, the fact that Trump squeaked out an electoral-college victory laid waste to the plans you had for the next four years. It was going to be such fun! A Clinton presidency would have been a glorious time, filled with purpose and professional success. Now you find yourself defending a dreadful health-care plan, but if she were president, you would have been luxuriating in constant congressional investigations, innumerable phony scandals and an endless supply of things to get outraged about. And outrage is the fuel of conservative media its what provides the content, engages the viewers and listeners, and keeps the audience coming back. Getting people mad is much easier than persuading them to feel happy or hopeful or excited about what the administration is doing.

Thats especially true if the administration isnt actually doing very much. As the months drag on without any significant achievements from the Trump administration, the need to pump up the emotional volume becomes more acute. And emotion comes not from discussions about policy but from stories with heroes and villains.

The problem for conservatives is that American politics today is a story that has its hero but doesnt have a villain. The president makes news nearly every day, but we can go weeks without hearing something interesting from Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) or Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). And like all opposition leaders, next to the president with the majesty of his office behind him, they look small and inconsequential, barely worth getting mad at.

Trump got elected in large part by getting his voters mad at immigrants, at Muslims, at politicians and at a supposedly rigged political system. But as president, hes had a hard time sustaining that anger and constructing that story of himself as a warrior fighting against a threatening enemy.

Other Republican presidents had it much easier. President Ronald Reagan had a natural counterpoint in the Russians, an enemy Americans had hated for decades. The Cold War provided opportunities for threat and confrontation invade a tiny island country here, make a speech in Berlin there, and you have a drama that never gets old. President George W. Bush spent eight years telling Americans they were about to be annihilated by villainous Middle Easterners, first al-Qaeda, then Saddam Hussein. By the end of his tenure the story had lost its punch, but it did get him reelected.

Trump, on the other hand, has no villain to fight. So he and his allies are left looking backward to the person who was supposed to be the villain of the moment but now is just a retiree strolling around the woods in Westchester County. No wonder they seem so dispirited.

Read more:
Why Trump and the conservative media are still obsessed with Hillary Clinton - Washington Post