It was the strange, offbeat answer heard ‘round the world. When confronted about her relationship with Wall Street donors during Saturday night’s Democratic debate, Clinton launched into one of the more bizarre responses of the night:

You know, not only do I have hundreds of thousands of donors, most of them small, I am very proud that for the first time a majority of my donors are women, 60 percent. (APPLAUSE) So I—I represented New York. And I represented New York on 9/11 when we were attacked.

Where were we attacked? We were attacked in downtown Manhattan where Wall Street is. I did spend a whole lot of time and effort helping them rebuild. That was good for New York. It was good for the economy. And it was a way to rebuke the terrorists who had attacked our country. (APPLAUSE)

As CBS’s transcript shows, Clinton’s response wasn’t immediately received as absurd. The crowd, which had been sedate for most of the evening, applauded loudly twice as her remarks unfolded. But then things took a turn.

Online, Twitter exploded with bewildered commentary. Had Clinton really just explained away the millions of dollars she has accepted from Wall Street over the years by bringing up 9/11? Did she really append the gender of her donors to that Escher painting of an answer?

The gender card and the 9/11 card in one answer. This woman is a pro. — Molly Ball (@mollyesque) November 15, 2015

A little later in the debate, moderators presented Clinton with the following tweet from law professor Andy Grewal, probing her earlier response.



Have never seen a candidate invoke 9/11 to justify millions of Wall Street donations. Until now. @HillaryClinton #DemDebate — Andy Grewal (@AndyGrewal) November 15, 2015

In her reply, Clinton laughed nervously, doing little to exonerate herself. “I’m sorry that whoever tweeted that had that impression,” she said, “because I worked closely with New Yorkers after 9/11 for my entire first term to rebuild. And so yes, I did know people. I had a lot of folks give me donations from all kinds of backgrounds, say, ‘I don’t agree with you on everything. But I like what you do. I like how you stand up. I’m going to support you.’ [LAUGH] And I think that is absolutely perfect.” By dismissing Grewal’s interpretation and then doubling down on her original statements, Clinton missed an opportunity to build her answer into something coherent—and pundits noticed.