During the campaign and will cover the trump administration. They went written the acclaimed biography. From the top to the bottom of the campaign Jonathan Allen and uber the wellintentioned misfires. In the hidden thorns that turned the context into a devastating loss. Although the Clinton Campaign was widely covered and many autopsies have been conducted in the last several months the blowbyblow details have been shattered. The observations made here by campaign and Democratic Party are nothing less than devastating. Sure to dismaying not just for supporters but also everyone who talks about the outcome. And the outcome of the election. Without further ado please join me in welcoming Jonathan Allen and amie parnes. That evening, thank you for coming. People we dont know yet. There is my family waving over there. They must of been drinking already. They are laughing like they were. I think what we will do here is read a little bit of one of the early chapters of the book. And then we will talk a little bit about what our process was and then we will take a process from everybody. We will read a little part of Chapter Seven which is a chapter that centers around iowa. Its called i was certain we were going to lose. Bill clinton was pissed off, he hollered at john podesta loud enough to be heard through the walls of the little room. In Downtown Des Moines iowa. It was the pundits he was watching on tv. They were getting it all wrong again. As a result of the iowa caucus trickled in. Hillary was leading but it was going to be tight. Omg he said it doesnt get a whole lot closer than that. That assessment invited parallels to the 2008 loss to barack obama. It was in those views and absurd comparison after all that have been a three way race and she was still likely to come out the winner on this night. The snake. Not the thirdplace finisher. But they were competing with her in iowa and deja vu was a hard Straight Line to resist. The outcome tonight ensures that this race is going to go on for months and months on the democratic side the perception all night had been that hillary was a such a prohibited front runner heading into the democratic nomination that they should have cleaned up easily. Bill had a much different perspective. Iowa had never been clinton country. And hillary had increased the share from under 30 in 2008 to 50 give or take a little in 2016. Plus unlike obama he was tailormade for iowa. The state is overwhelmingly white. With decidedly workingclass even as Bernie Sanders was able to eke out a victory. Why couldnt they see the difference on one level it was just another of his routine fix about television personnel. They had declared obama the winner of that 2008 primary in may of that year. But it was another sign of the inability to tamp down his emotions at the start of the day he have gone for a walk with his aides to release some of the building stress and at one point he played a combination of card games. He was the protective husband and in a concerned democrat and now he was shouting eight years years of pent up frustration at his longtime friend and advisor. When bill had spent himself he calmly walked into an adjoining space that was part of the sweep for caucus night. He found the man he was looking for i was state director matt paul. And in his mid 40s paul had left his job as medications director to one run the iowa operation. Having served on the president ial campaign in iowa in the former aide to the sect. Paul knew the states electoral is was anyone. They back into the call. You go in there and deal with them. Paul gathered himself and walked into find the former president sitting in the chair. Bill was wearing a suit and a pair of leather gloves. His arms were crossed. Even if they had been audible through the walls of the Boutique Hotel it wouldve been clear that he was in a foul mood. His eyes were fixed on paul. If there is ever a time. This is it. Bill fired questions at him. What is still outstanding in polk county. And how about cedar rapids. Paul walked built through the state and where they still have him and reported county by county. Slowly the president s anger subsided even if his anxiety didnt. Hitler have gotten out to a lead consistent with where her team that she would be heading into caucusing. She is up a handful of points. But sanders was slowly closing in on her. After paul briefed a the bill the two men briefed them. Even in front of the others he bore down on paul. There was a market shift in bills personality. On this night, he wanted to know what the staff didnt know and why they didnt know it. Then and particularly in iowa. The numbers have come in as very small fractions. Paul gave up the dates to the former president. And reports that werent meaningful updates. But remained upbeat if not rosy about hillarys chances of pulling it out. Paul concluded that what really mattered was which caucus site remained unreported. If they were in the core of des Moines Hillary was screwed. They also knew the state like the road. It is not getting better. It will keep going down. Let me to say before we go any further were really happy to have cspan here. We really like to say it. We found out as we were walking in here today that this book showed up as number one on barnes noble on the website we would be remiss in not mentioning them. They send along the wall. They are really responsible for a lot of what happens. Even though john and i had worked together for two books in five years. I think we still dont really i think we have a idea of johns favorite moments and the inner workings but i kind of dont also. I figured we will kick it off this way. Will let you guys chime in as well. Lets set up by talking about the favorite moment of the book. There was an interesting thing that happened on Election Night. They have a similar experience to us which was that we were expected and that Hillary Clinton was good to be the next president of the United States. And unlike them. I assume they were not in their writing a book about the election. And one of the first things that we discussed the immediate aftermath of the election with the surprise of the election. For us what are the things that we really wanted to want to focus in on at the end of the campaign. We hadnt really have a chance to talk to folks. And get this. We thought it would be a tremendous failure on her part if you cannot get a ticktock of Election Night of what was going on. s effort that they went to to really talk about that and whats going on. When they were in midtown manhattan where her Data Analytics folks and her pollster and some of the people really crunching numbers on how in the states where they were all working. It was the brooklyn headquarters. In the center where her Victory Party was. We spent a tremendous amount of time trying to piece together what happened putting together a ticktock and trying to get the time element and there was a tremendous, there are a lot of things in this book that have not appeared anywhere alls. They were the first report in late november because we were afraid someone would report it before president obama had urged her to concede when she wasnt ready to. What the feelings were. Among her staff and her family. We have all of this reporting and no one else did about this really incredibly shocking moment for not only the country but obviously the clinton people. So what was your favorite part of this book . So what was your favorite part of this book . That obviously because it took a lot of work. Every authors favorite part is a byline. Its really the second favorite part. It was great to actually i think everyone wanted to know what was going on inside that room. I also we wanted to know the real story obviously they kept trying to portray a joyful campaign. And we saw signs it was not such a joyful campaign. So we can immediate omission to get the real story from people and initially people would be like thats great its going well. And slowly we started hearing the real story and we were interviewing one source actually. Because the story is about the people in the brooklyn headquarters. And a source actually told us at the very tail end of the interview there was one moment right after michigan she was really pissed off i cant really tell you anymore. You can have to talk to other people who are in the room for that. I was like come on tell us a little bit more about what happened here. Talk to some other people in the room and he gave us these names. And we try to make it a mission to find out what exactly went down in that moment. Finally we circled back months later separately we couldve have children in that time. In this one source we said come on we really want to know what happened here. Bits and pieces of what happened. This is postelection now. This was like pre migration like it mightve to get mightve and after christmas. So finally a source tells us what happened. And it resulted in us finding out that she was really frustrated by what have happened in michigan during the primary she was angry at her aides. These were the moments that make this book what it is. Its a real book about what happened told through the people not to their outsiders the people inside the campaign. I think that kind of moment shines in this book and us the civilly aim to do. I want to know what you think is the hardest part of reporting out this book. If i was like chalk up what is my press accomplishment just as a reporter its like breaking into this circle and getting people to tell us stop because it is a famously especially in this campaign a group that was leaking a lot. Very afraid of the repercussions and having leaks come back on them. Hillary clinton is obsessed after 2008 with that having licked it. She believed that the leaks have really hurt her in 2008 rather than seen seeing them as symptoms. It was something that was plaguing her campaign. This time around a lot of these people thought they were going to be working in administration. They thought they were working in the white house. There was a lot of incentive not to bring problems externally. To meet the hardest part was getting people to talk. Detail by detail. Going back to the same people over and over again. Matching wits and be set in april with what they said in september. It has a reminder. It was a reminder of the thing that they really know in their hearts. If you want to get something good you just head to work at it. We were able to bring to light some things just in terms of the basic story. You can agree with conclusions and disagree. I dont think their analysis of the is right. At the end of the day there is a ton of new reporting in this. Im so proud of that. It was hard work for us. I know my family sacrifice for it. Im proud of that. I want to know from you what your biggest fear is now thats out because weve been sitting on this finished product for a few weeks waiting for it to come out. It was just to redo into the experience of an author i think we can say this. We heard that there was likely to be a review on friday. And it came out before we expected it to. It was really very good. For weeks it went around with a finished product that no one else has read. It was just as hard to write. Now that its out and people get to look at it what is your fear. I want people to understand that weve got some feedback on twitter and other social media that we are biased reporters we went into this trying to, we were trying to tell it. We wrote what some people thought it was a synthetic book of the first time around. This one is basically what we saw and heard from everyone in the campaign on so i can watch people. My big fear is that this would be misinterpreted. We actually went about reporting this we thought obviously that she was in a win. And our reporting changed. The direction didnt really even change because we have seen signs of problems all throughout the campaign but what happened was she lost. We have to quickly interview people and do that right after the election. And that was a really quick turnaround. I can want people to understand that process without judging how we do this and whether or not we were taking sides and who we voted for my reporting is my Public Service and i dont take sides. I want people to judge this fairly and to read it before the actually judge it. I think you are getting that. We picked up as amy was seen on a saying on a lot of problems in the campaign and we picked up on some of the misery in the campaign. And Hillary Clinton feeling like she didnt have a handle. Her basically saying to people i understand whats happening with the country right now. We obviously sought was a problem in terms of the democratic primary. And regardless of the popular vote totals. And certainly in the right state. There is something that Bernie Sanders and donald trump were tapping into that she a lot of trouble understanding. I think it was her general belief very strong belief in systems and working inside the system to make change rather than breaking down the system to make change. But we saw all of this going on for months and months her inability to really touch what was going on in the country and the dysfunction on the campaign was weird to us because we saw the polls and we said cheers and when. And only says shes going there seems to be a pretty good patent there. I hope im not talking at a school too much here. It sounds like shes gonna lose. Im having trouble understanding because it looks like shes going. But if you like something shes can lose. You have to figure that out. Were reporters. This is whats going on. And it may be that theyre forward projections of what might be there. We are struggling with that. We have seen all of the signs and obviously it was close enough the that the election couldve gone either way. Any number of things could have tipped it one way or the other. But we have seen all of the signs and not necessarily. We trusted our gut in terms of just doing the reporting. I do get the reason we were able to produce it fairly quickly after the election. And reformulate assumptions because we just laid out what the reporting was. What is your favorite quote from the book . . Thats rough. My favorite quote from the book. Not only am i sorry the longer quote is mister president , i am sorry. I would have to agree. We will open it up to questions because we want to hear from you all. I do have a question and answer my cure. Reach her hand and i will come to you. I would like to know if you have any theories as far as why the former Vice President biden didnt run and how much influence do you feel president obama had as far as who could challenge Hillary Clinton at that candidate wouldve have a fair chance and lastly why do you think president obama did not pardon her. Lets go there first. We have if you talk to sources and we did about why he didnt run it was bad timing for him. He needed to make a decision pretty quickly his son have died tragically a few months earlier he wanted to make a decision over the summer but the clock was ticking. His donors that cap calling and wondering what was taking so long. Finally, fall crept in he realized that he have to make a decision meanwhile secretary clinton was a box of him in. And doing things that allowed him to do what he needed to do. Shed already taken many of the donors time have run out. He was unhappy about it. We report that in the book. He confided to advisers and donors that she was plain ugly. He was not happy with it. I think they have a cordial relationship like he was really angry with her at that moment with doing what she did. Especially when he needed time and he needed time to grieve and make a decision and now hes not ruling it out if you care him in interviews hes basically leaving the door open. I think he wants to run again. I think he wanted to run then but the timing was bad. In terms of the parted in terms of president obama he wanted to remain neutral but everybody knew that he preferred secretary clinton which i think prevent a lot of Democratic Candidates from getting it or from even thinking about getting in. Why would you run against the sitting president. Who already has all of the superdelegates. When people talk to her skills as a candidate once gil was clearing the field. She did get Bernie Sanders not to run but there were a lot of other democrats who might have it run for president but did not. And the bench is pretty thin right now. As far as the parted goes. No reason to pardon her. He said he would not recommend the prosecution. I dont think he is going to and present his imprison his successor no matter how much someone dislikes what he does. I dont think were at that point right now or anywhere close to it. Theres no reason to issue a pardon have he done so it wouldve been a stand on both the president and clinton. [inaudible] the decision by Mister Clinton dash mike mrs. Clinton to keep the personal email and any consideration to the fact that there would be potential backlash on been a coverup of something. I think this is a question in case people do that here. Why she would delete the personal email those that were termed dash mike deemed personal. She was trying to hide something. The personal emails belong to her. Her lawyers and top aides who are lawyers looked through and they determined what was working and what was personal. And having worked at looked at her work email and seen all of the information that was classified to ended up in her work email that was on the private server it seems pretty clear that they didnt sit around saying this could be a problem lets just delete it. They may have made a bad judgment. I take it was a poor decision. To set up that private server and one probably motivated by the desire to not had her files out there in the open under freedom of information act request. That worked out very well for her as you all know. In terms of the personal nature of emails those belonged to her and no one else. There should be a problem with that as long as they are making the good decisions about it. Giving what you know now through your reporting if you have to pick one would you say the Clinton Campaign lost or the Trump Campaign one. Both. I think its really, located and we been getting that question a lot the last few days. As they were