Valerie Plame on Sharing Anti-Semitic Article: ‘Not Who I Am… We All Make Mistakes’
Valerie Plame, the former CIA officer infamously outed in 2003, is running for Congress. She spoke with MSNBC’s Kasie Hunt about her run on Sunday night, but she also addressed an anti-Semitic article she shared in 2017.
Back in September 2017, Plame shared an article that was titled “America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars,” subsequently clarifying in a tweet, “First of all, calm down. Re-tweets don’t imply endorsement. Yes, very provocative, but thoughtful. Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish.”
She later apologized and said, “OK folks, look, I messed up. I skimmed this piece, zeroed in on the neocon criticism, and shared it without seeing and considering the rest.”
After talking about the Scooter Libby pardon, Hunt brought up to Plame a recent National Review article on her sharing that piece:
“You got some criticism for this because the article that you linked to said America’s Jews are driving America’s wars. I know that you later backtracked, saying that you messed up. How much of a campaign issue do you think this is potentially going to be for you? And is there anything you would like to say to correct the record now?”
“I did way more than backtrack,” Plame said. “Let me be clear. It’s not who I am, and it’s not what I believe. It was extremely painful. I had not read the whole article all the way through. And when I realized what it was, it was embarrassing and hurtful. So I apologize deeply and sincerely, and I’ve done it multiple times both privately and publicly. It was really just a very painful period, but I want to move forward. That’s not who I am.”
“I’m human, and we all make mistakes, and it was just a doozy, and it was very public,” she added.
You can watch above, via MSNBC.
[image via screengrab]
