Remember the “lock her up” chants that rang out during the many of President-Elect Donald Trump’s campaign rallies? This intense call-to-action referred to Trump’s insistence that former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton should serve time for her infamous email scandal. Well, according to Kellyanne Conway, Trump’s changed his mind now that he’ll soon have a chance to follow through on many of his campaign promises. CNN reports Trump’s former campaign manager has confirmed that Trump no longer plans to take legal action against Clinton.
Though already at the forefront of American media, Trump gained more national attention when he threatened Clinton at the second presidential debate. “If I win, I am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into your situation,” Trump said at the time. The threat then evolved from a brief soundbite to, as CNN calls it, one of the president-elect’s most significant campaign promises.
Trump’s campaign continued to focus on throwing Clinton in jail. According to Huffington Post, the team criticized FBI Director James Comey for his initial disinterest in pressing charges against Clinton, congratulated him for introducing new evidence in the days leading up to the election, and then called him out for deciding that there was ultimately still no case worth pursuing in a courtroom.
Shortly after winning the election, Trump began to move away from his promise. Although he did tell 60 Minutes he would think about appointing a special Clinton prosecutor, the president-elect was quick to point out that he has more pressing issues to consider.
“I feel I want to focus on jobs. I want to focus on healthcare, I want to focus on the border and immigration and doing a really great immigration bill. And I want to focus on—all of these other things that we’ve been talking about,” he said in an interview with the program.
Trump now calls Clinton a good person, and Conway told MSNBC’s Morning Joe that “if Donald Trump can help her heal, then perhaps that’s a good thing to do.” Yeah, this feels about as natural as a bully offering to help a kid fix his underwear after giving him an atomic wedgie.