The New York Times has produced a long piece by five — count them, five — reporters about Harvey Weinstein’s misdeeds. When it finally rains, it pours.
The Times reports that two major Hillary Clinton supporters — Lena Dunham and Tina Brown — warned the campaign about Weinstein’s visibility at Clinton functions. Dunham claims she told a campaign staffer:
I just want you to let you know that Harvey’s a rapist and this is going to come out at some point. I think it’s a really bad idea for him to host fund-raisers and be involved because it’s an open secret in Hollywood that he has a problem with sexual assault.
When Dunham’s warning went unheeded, she says she turned to another staffer and tried again. To no avail.
The two staffers apparently don’t deny being warned by Dunham. Instead, they insist they never heard anything about rape.
Brown told the Times she advised another Clinton operative that she was hearing “that Harvey’s sleaziness with women had escalated since I left Talk in 2002 and [Clinton] was unwise to be so closely associated with him.”
“Escalating sleaziness,” an interesting turn of phrase.
It should be noted that the Clinton campaign paid no price for ignoring the warnings of Dunham and Brown. Weinstein’s escalating sleaziness did not come out during the campaign.
Would it have come out if Clinton had won the election? Maybe, maybe not. Would it have damaged her presidency? I don’t think so. Would Dunham and Brown be telling the Times about warning the campaign? I very much doubt it.
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