First Lady Admits ‘Missteps’ in Handling Whitewater Controversy

First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton acknowledged Saturday “a lot of missteps” in the handling of the Whitewater controversy and, in part, blamed her desire for privacy for the matter not being explained earlier and more fully.

“Of course I made mistakes,” she said in an interview with Newsweek magazine, discussing the handling of the controversy.

She said “this thing has gotten blown so out of proportion” and that she regretted not recognizing sooner that journalists would pursue the matter if details were not provided.

In a separate interview with Time magazine, she said: “We made lots of mistakes. We never should have made the investment, for one.”

Until the interviews with the magazines, the First Lady, whose role in Whitewater has come under increasing scrutiny, has had little public comment on the matter.

She was involved in the Whitewater land deal in the 1970s, both by managing her family’s financial affairs and as an Arkansas attorney who represented Madison Guaranty Savings & Loan, which had ties to Whitewater.

She told Newsweek that “I get my back up every so often” about having to answer questions she believes have no connection with her husband’s public life.

“I really have been pulled kicking and screaming to the conclusion that if you choose to run for public office you give up any zone of privacy at all,” she said.