WikiLeaks emails: Clinton aides debated whether her husband should speak before Wall Street firm

The subject line was simple: “WJC speeches,” in reference to former President Bill Clinton.

According to purportedly newly leaked emails, obtained and posted by WikiLeaks on Friday, aides to Hillary Clinton appeared to express concerns over the bad optics that could shade her presidential campaign if the former president delivered a scheduled speech to a Wall Street firm.

In the emails WikiLeaks has posted, Robby Mook, Clinton’s campaign manager, purportedly wanted the former president to cancel a paid speech to the financial services corporation Morgan Stanley, as it was set for around the date Hillary Clinton would be announcing her presidential bid in April 2015.

“I feel very strongly that doing the speech is a mistake – the data are very clear on the potential consequences,” Mook wrote. “I recognize the sacrifice and disappointment that cancelling will create, but it’s a very consequential unforced error and could plague us in stories for months. People would (rightfully) ask how we let it happen.”

Yet Huma Abedin, a close aide to Hillary Clinton, purportedly wrote that the former first lady did not want her husband to cancel the speech.

Eventually they came to an agreement and Bill Clinton canceled the speech, according to the emails on WikiLeaks.

Throughout the campaign, Hillary Clinton has been castigated by Republicans and even some Democrats for paid speeches she and her husband have delivered to Wall Street firms. So far, Hillary Clinton has not released transcripts of those speeches.

Earlier this month, WikiLeaks revealed details of some of the lucrative speeches Clinton delivered behind closed doors after she left the Obama administration in 2013.

In one excerpt from a speech, Clinton spoke of the need to maintain “both a public and a private position” on politically difficult issues, according to the WikiLeaks documents.

The Clinton campaign has refused to confirm or deny the authenticity of the emails, blaming the Russian government for hacking into Democratic officials’ emails in an attempt to help Donald Trump.