Hillary Clinton on Being 'Emotionally Drained' After Talking Monica Lewinsky Scandal for Docuseries

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Hi, Hillary.
Hi.
Hi, Ellen.
The last time you were here, you were sitting here
saying that, when you're elected,
you were going to let us do our show in the White House.
That's right, I did say that.
Yeah, we didn't get to do it.
Well, we didn't get to do it.
No, we did not.
But there is a different kind of show going on.
There is.
[LAUGHTER]
There is a show going on.
I'm sure you're watching.
But I'll talk to whoever's next and see
if we can get that done.
All right.
That's a deal?
Yeah, yeah, I want to--
exactly.
Because I would like to do the show in the White House.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'd love you to.
I would love to do it.
This is--
Dancing, too.
Keep the dancing, right?
[APPLAUSE]
More dancing.
More dancing.
Moore dancing in the world, that's what we need,
happiness and dancing.
This is a big week.
You're here.
The president was just--
Trump was just acquitted by the Senate of his impeachment.
Does that surprise?
Did you expect that?
Well, I wasn't surprised.
Because it's hard to get 67 votes
to convict and remove somebody.
But I was still disappointed that not more
of the Republicans were willing to take the stand that Mitt
Romney took.
Mitt Romney.
Mitt Romney.
Yeah.
[APPLAUSE]
He made an absolutely extraordinary speech
on the floor of the Senate, talking about
why he felt the weight of history on his shoulders,
and that he was going to vote to convict on one
of the articles of impeachment.
Look, the evidence was really clear.
There was no doubt by the time it
was all presented that, actually, the president had
done what he was accused of.
In fact, he'd admitted that he had
done what he was accused of.
He just didn't think that anybody
would hold him accountable.
So we're now moving on.
But I hope that voters and Americans
of all political stripes actually
pay attention and say to themselves, hey,
he has to be held accountable.
And now, the way to do that is in the election.
Yep, yep.
[APPLAUSE]
And like you said, this is just people doing what's right
and what's--
I mean, Mitt Romney is a Republican.
The fact that he is standing and saying, no, this is not right,
is a very important thing.
Well, it was really important.
And it was the first time in our history
that there has ever been a bipartisan vote to convict,
it was the first time ever.
But also, if you actually listen, as I did,
to what a lot of the other Republican senators said,
they all said things like, this is terrible behavior,
it was inappropriate, it wasn't right,
he shouldn't have done it, I hope
he doesn't do anything bad again,
but I'm not going to vote to convict.
So even the words of senators who
ended up voting to acquit him need to be remembered.
Because for whatever combination of reasons,
they were not willing to take the historic stand
that Mitt Romney took, who, remember
was the Republican nominee for president not so long ago,
got more than 60 million votes.
And so his taking that stand, combined
with all of the other remarks that
different Republican senators had to say,
there's no doubt what the president did was wrong.
It was to promote his own personal interests, not
the interests of our country.
It did put our national security at risk.
And everything that was said was proven.
So now it's voters who are going to have to say, OK,
I have to take responsibility for this
and follow Mitt Romney's lead.
Yeah, I hope this is going to be the biggest voter turnout ever.
I mean, this is the most important--
Yes, right, right.
I mean, we really--
and now that you have a lot of these-- the voters
for the Democrat side, they aren't
ready to make a decision yet.
I mean, what do you say to these people who are still undecided?
Look, the primary process is very long.
It's very rigorous.
It's difficult. Candidates will have ups and downs.
I know that very well, myself.
And I say two things.
I say, vote for the person that you believe
can actually win in November and the person who you think
can govern our country.
Because somebody has to get in there
and try to bring our country together,
and try to put us on the right track into the future
and restore our democracy, and our standing in the world.
So it's those two factors, who do you think can win?
Because if you don't win, you can't govern.
And who can best govern at a very difficult time
in American history.
Because it seems to me, more than ever,
we need somebody who is going to go in and be
able to kind of steer this ship in the right direction instead
of going to an extreme.
Yes.
Do you have somebody you're leaning towards right now?
Will you even say?
No.
I am saying the same thing to everybody.
Please look at the candidates.
And clearly, you'll like somebody better than others.
And then analyze that person's positions, and their message,
and can that person win?
Because remember, it's not the popular vote.
It's the electoral college.
Because I got 3 million more votes but lost by 70,000 or so
in the electoral college.
And so you've got to be very clear minded about who can win.
But it's not enough just to win.
You want somebody who, as you rightly said,
is going to try to get us back on track.
You know, we have so much to be proud of in our country.
We have so many wonderful people and great things
that are going on.
But we need to get back into what
I call the future business.
We need to be investing in our future.
That means dealing with climate change.
That means dealing with health care.
It means making the economy work for everybody.
And these things are not easy to do.
So you need somebody who knows how to govern.
And I just want everybody to pay attention.
Because as you say, we really should have the biggest turnout
ever in this next election.
And not just listen to what people are saying they can do,
because anyone can say anything.
Like in your documentary, you refuse
to say things that you knew you couldn't get done.
And you could have said a lot of things.
I mean, the documentary is so good.
I can't wait for people to see it.
It's really, really good and revealing.
We have to take a break.
But I'm just so glad to see you again.
And I love this documentary.
And people will see so--
what a life you've had.
What a life you've had.
We'll be back.
We're back with Hillary Clinton.
So this documentary, which is on Hulu--
which will be on Hulu.
I don't know when it comes out.
March 6th.
March 6th, it's so good.
It is a four-part docuseries.
You really didn't plan on doing this.
But you had all this footage from campaigning
and from your life.
And they put a documentary together.
Well, originally, I thought it was
going to be a kind of behind the scenes look at the campaign.
Because we had about 1,700 hours of footage
that was backstage, on the plane, on the bus.
I, mean everything that people were interested in,
we had all this footage.
And a couple of folks said, how about a campaign documentary?
I said, fine.
And Hulu ended up buying it and hired
a director who I met before the decision was made.
I thought she was terrific.
And so she came back to me.
She looked at all the 1,700 hours.
Then she came back to me.
She goes, you know, there's a bigger story here.
And, yes, it's a story about your life.
But it's also a story about women's lives
over the last 50 to 60 years.
It's about the women's movement.
It's about the American political system.
And we'd like to do more than just a behind the scenes look.
I said, OK, sounds good.
I still didn't really have any idea what this would entail.
So I ended up doing 35 hours of interviews.
And I was amazed when I finally saw
the documentary myself at who she had tracked down,
the people that she talked to.
And there's a really--
it's probably only personal to me and my closest friends.
But there's a woman in the documentary who was my best
friend since sixth grade.
And she had breast cancer.
And she'd been fighting it for 10 years.
And the director, Nanette Burstein, called her and said,
would you be willing to be interviewed?
And Betsy said sure.
So they interviewed her.
And she was very sick when they interviewed her.
And she died shortly after that.
So for me, watching the documentary,
and seeing people from my childhood,
from my young adulthood, obviously, people
from my campaigns, and working on health care, everything
we did, for me, seeing my dear, dear friend in that documentary
shortly before we lost her just made it so real.
I mean, there are things in it that I didn't remember, Ellen.
I mean, there's a scene that the director and her staff,
her team, found where I was working on affordable health
care.
And I was being burned in effigy because I
wanted to get quality affordable health care for everybody.
And people are burning me in effigy.
And I thought, wow, what does that really tell you
about how hard it is to get things done
that actually help people?
So there's a lot of really interesting insights.
And again, not just about me in my life,
but about a lot of our lives.
Yeah, no, I mean, it really is.
I mean, I was just reminded how attacked
you were for everything, for you didn't smile enough.
And over and over again hearing people didn't like you,
and how hard that must be to hear everybody
telling you have to dress different,
you have to wear your hair different, and nobody likes you
and you don't come off warm.
And it's just attack, after attack,
after attack, which just shows your strength.
And they wouldn't do that to a man.
They wouldn't attack the way he's dressed, or his hair,
or whatever.
It's crazy how attacked you were.
But what's amazing, too--
I want to talk about this now.
And then we'll take a break.
OK.
But there was nothing off topic, that you went there
with Monica Lewinsky.
President Clinton talked about Monica Lewinsky.
Because you said, you can ask anything.
Right.
Was that really difficult for you?
I mean, it must have been really tough to relive that.
Yeah, it was.
Once I agreed to cooperate, the director
said, well, we're going to talk about everything.
And I said, OK.
And yet, when it actually came time, yeah, it's hard.
You know, as I said when I was talking about the book Chelsea
and I wrote, The Book of Gutsy Women,
that staying in my marriage was the gutsiest personal decision
I ever made.
And so for me, revisiting that, talking about it,
for my husband also to agree to be in the film,
and then also to be asked, you know, made it a bit difficult.
There's no doubt about it.
But you couldn't actually do a film about my life
and not cover something that everybody knew about,
because you could read about it, and everybody had an opinion
about.
And it's fascinating.
Because as you go through the film, some of the women
who have been my friends, and who
have supported me personally in every other way,
they talked about it.
They talked about how so many women
would be really upset because I chose to stay with my husband.
And they would go and talk to these women.
And a lot of the women would say,
well, I just can't I can't support her.
I don't like her because she stayed with her husband.
And they would say, oh, OK, well, why is that?
And people would talk.
But then pretty soon they would say,
well, you know, that happened to my sister.
That happened to my friend.
That happened-- and I always said,
everybody needs to make the best decision
for you and your family.
And toward the end of the film, one
of the people who is both a friend
and also worked in my campaigns said, you know,
it just was such a strange conversation.
Because some of the very same people who would say,
I could never support her, would say, literally
in the next breath, but I love her husband.
I love Bill Clinton.
I said, well, I do, too.
But it was a really emotionally draining experience
to go through it again.
But I have to say, once I saw the whole four
hours of the documentary, I hope that our talking about this,
my willingness to address all of this,
really does help other people.
I mean, there are lessons.
There are lessons from my life, from our times.
Because people need to be thoughtful about the decisions
they make in their own lives.
And we should be kinder and more supportive to everybody
who makes the best decisions that they think they can make.
Absolutely.
It's a fascinating documentary.
It's fascinating.
I mean, really, when you hear them
talk about it, and everything else that you talk about,
it's eye opening, and informative.
And we'll take a break.
More with Hillary after this.
That's a very common concern that people still have,
that somehow a woman president will act on her emotions.
And by the time somebody runs for president,
you've actually been through a lot, through a lot of life.
Usually, you've been elected to something.
Sometimes not.
But often, yes.
And it really strikes me as quite odd.
Because most of the criticism-- and as I alluded to in the clip
there--
is because I didn't show my emotions enough.
I wasn't emotional enough.
I should have been, I don't know, emoting more.
But I thought, you know it's such a highly
responsible, awesome job being president,
that I needed to demonstrate that, hey, I can handle this.
I can do it.
I'm not going to get knocked around.
And now, you know we've got one of the most
emotionally acting out people ever
in the history of our country in the White House.
And I don't hear anybody saying, he's just too emotional,
you know?
So we still have a ways to go until women
are going to be judged by the same standards instead
of the old double standard.
Yeah, it really is crazy.
We can really see something for what it is.
But we're so used to being women, and being
taught to stay quiet or smile more, or whatever,
and not yell.
And it's a really great documentary.
You're getting some heat for some stuff
you said about Bernie Sanders.
Mm-hm.
It must feel good that you can say whatever you want now.
Mm-hm.
But you want to talk about that moment?
Well, it's from the film, which was probably filmed,
I don't know, year and a half or so ago.
So it wasn't in the midst of the election.
But, yeah, I feel like I have a pretty clear perspective
about what it's going to take to win.
And as I said earlier, that's what
I think the key calculation for any voter has to be.
But you know, people can have their own opinions
about anybody in public life.
That's a free country, you get to do that.
But I think, as I say in the film,
you've got to be responsible for what you say
and what you say you're going to do.
We need to rebuild trust in our fellow Americans
and in our institutions.
And if you promise the moon and you can't deliver the moon,
then that's going to be one more indicator of how we just
can't trust each other.
So it's not it's not good theater.
It's not, maybe, good politics anymore.
But I think you should tell people what you mean,
mean what you say, and have some sense of responsibility
for how you would get anything done that you talk about.
So health care, let's take health care, for example.
Look, I want quality, affordable health care for everybody.
And I've been fighting for more than 25 years.
I've been burned in effigy over it, all of that.
I want to get there.
But let's remember what's at stake.
We have a current president who's
trying to take away fundamental health care rights.
If you have a preexisting condition,
they are in court right now, the Trump administration,
trying to take that right away that you got
into the Affordable Care Act.
So we can have a big argument about, ideally,
what kind of health care we should want for everybody.
Because I'm on the frontlines on that battle.
But let's remember, if we don't win,
people will lose what they have right now.
So I just want everybody to understand
how high the stakes are and to hold
every candidate and every public office holder
accountable for what they do or they don't do.
[APPLAUSE]
Last question, last question, if someone
asked you to be vice president, would you do it?
Well, that's not going to happen.
But, no, probably, no.
You don't know that's not going to happen.
I think I do, yeah.
Really?
I think I do.
Yeah, I think I do.
All right.
But what if they did?
Oh, well, look, it's like when Barack Obama asked
me to be Secretary of State.
I was shocked.
I had no idea he was going to ask me.
And I turned him down twice.
He said, the economy's in freefall.
It's a catastrophe.
I've got to focus on that.
We've got problems around the world.
You go focus on that.
I said, no, no, I'm happy where I am.
You get somebody else.
I'm sure there's good people around.
And at the second time I said no, Mr. President-elect, I'm
not going to do it, he said, I'm not calling you
again until you say yes.
And so I'll tell you, I started thinking about it.
And I thought, if I'd won, and I'd
wanted to ask him to do something,
I would have wanted him to do that for me.
So I never say never.
Because I do believe in serving my country.
OK, so you will.
But it's not going to happen.
[APPLAUSE]
So you will.
Thank you for putting me in your book of gutsy women.
This is Hillary's book with Chelsea.
They wrote it, called The Book of Gutsy Women.
And it's a fantastic book.
And you have been on the forefront fighting
for women's rights since you were a young girl,
since you were in college.
I thank you for everything that you do, everything
that you have done for women.
As you say, human rights are women's rights,
women's rights are human rights.
Thank you for that.
I'm not stopping yet.
Hillary premieres March 6th on Hulu.
We'll be right back.
Hi, I'm Andy.
Ellen asked me to remind you to subscribe to her channel
so you can see more awesome videos,
like videos of me getting scared, or saying
embarrassing things, like ball peen hammer, and also
some videos of Ellen and other celebrities, if you're
into that sort of thing.
Ah!
Oh, [BLEEP]!
God [BLEEP]!