Jill Stein On Why Hillary Clinton Lost The Election: ‘Her Campaign Represented The Elite Neoliberal Establishment’

In an interview published Monday, former Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein did not mince words when asked why she thought Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton lost the November 8 election to her Republican rival Donald Trump.

“While Hillary Clinton actually won the popular vote, she lost critical support, and ultimately the election, because her campaign represented the elite neoliberal establishment in a year when voters were clamoring for change,” Stein told Alternet’s Vijay Prashad. “Working people hurt by the hollowing out of the U.S. economy saw her as more interested in serving Wall Street than helping Main Street. Her campaign failed to dispel widespread feelings that the Clintons were awash in cronyism, corruption, and dishonesty.”

Clinton is undeniably a member of the political and economic “elite,” but it’s awkward to suggest that her elevated economic standing had anything to do with her losing when she was running against a billionaire real estate mogul.

However, there is an argument to be made that Clinton’s ties to the political establishment and D.C. insiders did hinder her efforts to defeat Trump, a candidate who’s complete lack of political experience and unorthodox campaign cast him well outside the realm of business-as-usual in U.S. politics.

Jill Stein on @keithellison‘s run to lead the DNC & on the charge that the Greens cost Clinton the election, https://t.co/DhkSplKCeY

— Vijay Prashad (@vijayprashad) November 21, 2016

In a year when an inexperienced, unpolished conservative maverick and self-described democratic socialists were packing stadiums, it was clear that Americans were looking for something — anything — that offered a sense of change.

“To many Americans across the political spectrum, she came to symbolize everything that is wrong with Washington D.C.,” Stein said.

Stein’s comments will surely not sit well with Clinton supporters and the Democratic Party’s rank and file. The Green Party candidate became a thorn in their side as the Democratic primary wrapped up and it looked like she might siphon off significant numbers of disgruntled Bernie Sanders supporters.

Stein polled in the single digits throughout the election cycle, often with only two or three percent of respondents saying they intended to vote for her, according to data from Real Clear Politics. However, she occasionally peaked at five or six percent.

That was enough to give Democrats flashbacks to the 2000 election, in which Democratic candidate Al Gore lost to Republican George Bush by razor thin margins in several states. Many Democrats ultimately blame presidential candidate Ralph Nader, who ran on the Green Party ticket and won almost three percent of the popular vote that year, for Gore’s loss.

Stein ended up winning only a little over one percent of the popular vote this year, and, as a Washington Post article explains, arguing that she cost Clinton the election is based on “the unrealistic assumption that all Stein voters would have voted for Clinton.”

Why Liberal Elites Blame Jill Stein and White Men for Hillary Clinton’s Epic Fail https://t.co/rneJD6865r

— Tim Black ™ (@RealTimBlack) November 16, 2016

While it would be difficult to blame the outcome of the election on Stein in terms of the raw numbers, she and Sanders supporters have faced ridicule for their criticism of Hillary Clinton’s policies, particularly her foreign policy and her supposed ties to Wall Street, throughout the campaign cycle.

As the Inquisitr previously reported, Stein went so far as to say that Clinton is more dangerous than Trump when it comes to foreign policy, particularly in regards to Syria and Russia.

That was not the only time Stein suggested that Trump might actually have been the “less of two evils” in the 2016 presidential race.

In a Democracy Now! interview back in June, Stein made a comment that would become a common refrain throughout the rest of her campaign.

“Trump says very scary things—deporting immigrants, massive militarism and, you know, ignoring the climate,” Stein told host Amy Goodman. “Well, Hillary, unfortunately, has a track record for doing all of those things.”

It appears that Jill Stein still feels much the same about Hillary Clinton since she lost the election as she did before it.

[Featured Image by Win McNamee/Getty Images]