Jennifer Jacobs

jejacobs@dmreg.com

Hillary Clinton met with the Register's editorial board Tuesday. It was her first such session nationally in this campaign. Below are some comments she made before, during and after the wide-ranging discussion:

On the length of the hour-and-45-minute meeting with The Des Moines Register's editorial board:

"Just barely shorter than the CNN debate, I tell you. Oh my gosh, I was thinking — but I don't wear a watch anymore because it only frustrates me."

On rival Bernie Sanders' plan for free college tuition for all:

"I am not going to give free college to wealthy kids. I'm not going to give free college to kids who don't work some hours to try to put their own effort into their education."

On the biggest crisis the country faces:

"I think that we do have a crisis in wages. I think it's eating away at the living standards, the middle class lifestyle, the hopes and aspirations of millions of Americans, that their hard work is not paying off.

"I think that is both an economic crisis and a political crisis. Because when people feel that they are being left out ... then that gives rise to a lot of anxiety, insecurity, frustration, even anger in the political system. We're seeing that on both sides of the aisle, but particularly with Mr. Trump and his outrageous appeals to paranoia and prejudice. He gets some of the reaction he does in part because people are genuinely worried and anxious and looking for answers. I think if we don't start seeing wages rise, we will have a lot of political headwinds that could very well bring people into office who have a view of both the economy and our democracy at odds with what personally I think is in our best interest."

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On what kind of transparency she'd have in her White House for people who want to know what's going on with the government:

"Well, you can count on me not to have a private email server.

"...I see the pressures that are at work and how hard it is to manage the flood of information that is both coming and going. We have to get better at it. It's going to take some real investment and it's going to take attracting people into the government right now that aren't interested in coming into the government. ... I wish we could have a deep partnership for a couple of years with the technology experts and really go agency by agency trying to figure out how to make them more efficient, more transparent."

On the security of the private email server she used as U.S. secretary of state:

"There is no evidence it was ever breached." When one of the Register's opinion writers said, "That doesn't mean it wasn't," she answered: "Well, usually though people who are sophisticated can find trails and tracks, and we know the White House email was breached and we know that a lot of places that are supposed to be highly secured, we know that all the records were stolen out of the Office of Personnel Management, probably by the Chinese. So we can track the attacks."

Clinton: 'I can't answer' apparent email discrepancy

On the 2016 presidential race:

"I feel very good about where we are and what we're doing. It's going to be a hard-fought campaign, as it should be. I have absolutely no doubt that on both the Democratic side and on the Republican side there will be ups and downs, but I feel we very comfortable and very confident that we are well on the path to securing the nomination."

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