Former DNC chairwoman, Donna Brazile, has three words for Democratic critics of her 2016 tell-all book: "Go to Hell."
The erstwhile party poobah pulled no punches after being asked Sunday to reply to the intra-party backlash her book is eliciting.
She appeared in an interview on This Week with George Stephanopoulos:
"George, for those who are telling the me to shut up, they told Hillary that a couple of months ago," Brazile said. "You know what I tell them, go to hell. I’m going to tell my story."
Here's an excerpt from her exchange with George Stephanopoulos:
STEPHANOPOULOS: Passionate Democrats who say they feel betrayed by all this. Any regrets?
BRAZILE: Do I regret taking on a job the second time in my life as chair of the party, cleaning up everyone’s mess, taking all of the incoming, being unable to spend funds that I raised? Do I regret being on the road 100 percent of the time, being hacked by the Russians, being — being harassed, getting death threats? Do I regret any of that? George, was worse than Hurricane Katrina in terms of the emotional toll. But do I regret stranding up for what is right, helping Hillary Clinton, helping the Democratic Party?
And let me just say this, as somebody who went through the hacking experience, being able to tell the truth about what happened with the Russians, the attack on our government do I regret any of that? No. I wish I could have done more, George.
STEPHANOPOULOS: But do you think this helps for the book to come out?
BRAZILE: Well, George, I mean this is a lesson of 2016. If I released it next year, they would say, Donna, you’re impacting our 2018. If I released it the following — Donna, you’re impacting. George, for those who are telling the me to shut up, they told Hillary that a couple of months ago. You know what I tell them, go to hell. I’m going to tell my story. I’m going the tell my story, George.
Because this is a story of a young girl who started in American politics at the age of 9, who continues to fight each and every week of her life. I went down to Virginia last week, to kick off the canvassing campaign. Nobody paid me to do that. Nobody — I’m not on the payroll, George. I care about my country. I care about our democracy.
And I say go the hell because, why am I supposed to be the only person that is unable to tell my story?
Now, if — I have heard a lot of people tell me various things as well. But here’s what they don’t know. They don’t know what it was like to be over at the DNC during this hacking. They don’t know what it’s like to bury a child. I did, Seth Rich. They don’t know what it’s like to protect a staff from further harassment. They don’t know what it’s like because they’re — the high command of Brooklyn. The people who were making the decisions, even for the DNC, they didn’t come and work with us. They told us to shut up and basically let them win the election. And when we tried to intervene, we had to spend money we raised to try to help them win. And that was my job as chair of the party.