Approximately 99.9% of Trevor Noah’s time on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show” is spent trashing conservatives and praising progressives, so it came as quite the shocker on Monday when he hammered Hillary Clinton over her alleged treatment of a female staffer who complained of sexual harassment during the 2008 campaign:
Hillary’s Grammy cameo came at a weird moment for her because last night’s theme was “Me Too, Time’s Up,” which is a message Hillary found herself on the wrong side of over the weekend.
Noah then played multiple clips regarding allegations that during her 2008 run for president, Hillary Clinton kept “faith advisor” Burns Strider on the campaign after he allegedly sexually harassed a female staffer and was recommended for termination by then-manager Patti Solis Doyle.
One such clip featured CNN’s John King, who said, “Strider is accused of inappropriately touching the shoulders of a younger staffer, kissing her forehead, and sending her suggestive emails. …When the accusations made their way to candidate Clinton, she decided to dock him pay, and to reassign the woman to a new job instead of firing him.”
Noah continued:
Look, there’s a few areas where I don’t necessarily expect Hillary Clinton to nail it, you know? Managing emails, visiting Wisconsin — you know, weaknesses. But I won’t lie, I expected standing up for a woman on her staff to be one of her strengths. So this story is disturbing. Hillary learned that one of her female staffers was being sexually harassed, and instead of the man getting fired, the woman got reassigned. But all that woman did was come forward. She did what she was supposed to do, and then she got punished for it.
… And look, it’s possible that Hillary Clinton has a good explanation for why she kept this guy on over the objections of her top campaign advisors, but, instead of an explanation, all we got was this.
Noah then shared the following tweets from Clinton:
Noah continued:
Yeah, women deserve to be heard, and then quietly reassigned. Thank you for speaking up, now quietly into the closet. Like, I know that this incident happened ten years ago, and maybe ten years ago the world was a different place. But I don’t now, I thought in 2018, with everything we’re learning about now, maybe Hillary might come out and say: “Hey guys, I realize now that I was part of the problem in the way I handled this. When I look back, I realize I should have done better.” Because that’s the truth.
When we look back on all of our lives, we realize there are moments where we should have done better. But it feels like Hillary’s not only trying to dodge all the blame, she wants to present herself as having always been on this woman’s side, which doesn’t fly because not only did the woman get reassigned, but this guy, Burns Strider, he went on to get another job in Democratic politics where he got fired for doing the same thing to other women. So, you could argue that if Hillary had fired him, she would have been protecting many women instead of just herself.
On Tuesday, Clinton offered an apology on Facebook. You can decide on the merits of the text:
