A No-Nonsense Guide To Monica Lewinsky's Place In The 2016 Election

Hillary Clinton is tied to a few "scandal" buzzwords that opponents can use against her.

Some of these scandals are legitimate concerns, others are mean conspiracy theories and most fall in between the spectrum.

Elite Daily is explaining them to you as quickly as possible, along with some analysis on how much you should care about each one.

What happened:

In 1994, Paula Jones, who worked as an Arkansas state clerk when Bill Clinton was governor there, filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against then-president Clinton. This legal case went on for a while.

Meanwhile, in June 1995, Monica Lewinsky, 21, started an unpaid internship at the White House. By November, Clinton was having an affair with her. If you really want to get into the details, you can read excerpts from the Starr Report, which are for real scandalizing. By the end of 1997, Lewinsky got pulled into the Jones case.

In early 1998, the case became a big ol' public drama, and your parents probably shooed you out of the room when the news was on.

Clinton insisted he "did not have sexual relations with that woman." But he did. This all eventually led to his impeachment.

Clinton settled with Jones for $850,000.

What people say about it:

People say that Hillary allowed her husband to participate in this predatory behavior. These critiques came from both liberals and conservatives.

It made feminists who had previously supported Clinton super uncomfortable.

Should it matter in this election?

Not really. A wife is not responsible for her husband's behavior.

It's fair to criticize Bill (I mean, the power dynamics alone in the Lewinsky case are incriminating), but blaming Hillary for what her husband did is not cool.

It's fair to feel uncomfortable about the whole situation, but it's not necessarily a question that should come up for Hillary during debates.

Citations: CNN, History, LA Times, Washington Post