--- title: How Hillary Clinton Fared in Her 1994 Whitewater Press Conference description: Clinton's expected press conference on email usage has more than a little in common with her 1994 response to the Whitewater controversy. canonical: https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/ author: Eliza Berman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-10T16:32:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:59:43.583Z article:section: History og:title: How Hillary Clinton Fared the Last Time She Was in the Hot Seat og:description: Clinton's expected press conference on email usage has more than a little in common with her 1994 response to the Whitewater controversy. og:url: https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How Hillary Clinton Fared the Last Time She Was in the Hot Seat twitter:description: Clinton's expected press conference on email usage has more than a little in common with her 1994 response to the Whitewater controversy. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # How Hillary Clinton Fared the First Time She Was in the Hot Seat ## Video: Know Right Now: Clinton's Private Emails [Watch (HLS stream): Know Right Now: Clinton's Private Emails](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/JMnBWhXy.m3u8) (1:05)  _Published 2015-03-05. Hillary Clinton recently came under fire for using a private server for her email during her time as Secretary of State_  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Mar 10, 2015 4:32 PM UTC  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Mar 10, 2015 4:32 PM UTC On Tuesday afternoon, Hillary Rodham Clinton is [expected to hold a press conference ](http://time.com/3738859/hillary-clinton-email-scandal-un/)to take questions on last week’s revelation that she exclusively [used a personal email account](http://time.com/3731568/hillary-clinton-email/) instead of a government account during her time as Secretary of State. The decision to take questions on a controversy after a period of silence calls to mind a press conference Clinton gave on April 22, 1994, regarding the Whitewater scandal. Remembered by some as the “Pretty in Pink” press conference for the hue of Clinton’s suit, the 72-minute Q&A came months after reporters began demanding that the then-First Lady discuss her role in criticized commodity trades and an Arkansas land deal first reported on in 1992. The press conference, which the Clintons had been considering for weeks but scheduled only the night before, gave Clinton the opportunity to reclaim control of the narrative, and according to press reports from the time, she nailed it. As TIME’s Michael Duffy wrote then: --- > “” --- Clinton also explained the unfavorable attention she was receiving as a reaction to the unusually high level of influence she held as a First Lady. “We don’t fit easily into a lot of our pre-existing categories,” she said of her family, “And I think that, having been independent, having made decisions, it’s a little difficult for us as a country, maybe, to make the transition of having a woman like many of the women in this room, sitting in this house.” Her ability to muster the same measured confidence in response to criticism will undoubtedly figure prominently in her chances of sitting in that house again. **_Read coverage of the 1994 press conference here, in the TIME Vault:_** [Open and Unflappable](http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101940502-164301,00.html) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/"},"headline":"How Hillary Clinton Fared the First Time She Was in the Hot Seat","datePublished":"2015-03-10T16:32:32.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:59:43.583Z","description":"Facing questions on her role in the Whitewater controversy in 1994, Clinton's response was described then as cool and measured","url":"https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/","keywords":["politics","Hillary Clinton","hillary clinton emails"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Eliza Berman","jobTitle":"Berman is a senior editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/politics/","name":"politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/","name":"How Hillary Clinton Fared the First Time She Was in the Hot Seat"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Know Right Now: Clinton's Private Emails","description":"Hillary Clinton recently came under fire for using a private server for her email during her time as Secretary of State","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/JMnBWhXy/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2015-03-05T18:45:32.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/JMnBWhXy.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/","duration":"PT1M5S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3738967/hillary-clinton-whitewater/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```