What I did was allowed: Hillary Clinton says no email apology

Clinton also played down how the controversy has affected her personally as a presidential candidate

Hillary Rodham Clinton said today she does not need to apologize for using a private email account and server while secretary of state because "what I did was allowed."

In an interview with The Associated Press during a campaign swing through Iowa, which kicks off next year's state-by-state primary race, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination also said the lingering questions about her email practices while serving as President Barack Obama's top diplomat have not damaged her campaign.

"Not at all. It's a distraction, certainly," Clinton said.

"But it hasn't in any way affected the plan for our campaign, the efforts we're making to organize here in Iowa and elsewhere in the country. And I still feel very confident about the organization and the message that my campaign is putting out."

Yet even in calling the inquiry into how she used email while at the State Department a distraction, Clinton played down how it has affected her personally as a candidate.

"As the person who has been at the center of it, not very much," Clinton said. "I have worked really hard this summer, sticking to my game plan about how I wanted to sort of reintroduce myself to the American people."

Part of that includes, Clinton said, answering any questions about her email "in as many different settings as I can." The one-on-one interview with AP was the second for Clinton in the past four days, after having told NBC News on Friday that her decision not to use separate email accounts for her personal and public business wasn't the "best choice."

Clinton did not apologize for her decision when asked directly by NBC, "Are you sorry?" Asked Monday by the AP why she won't directly apologize, Clinton said: "What I did was allowed. It was allowed by the State Department. The State Department has confirmed that."

"I did not send or receive any information marked classified," Clinton said. "I take the responsibilities of handling classified materials very seriously and did so."

Last year, Clinton turned over roughly 55,000 pages of emails to the State Department that she sent and received using a home-brew email server set up at her home in suburban New York while serving as secretary of state from 2009 to 2013.