
Former President Bill Clinton spent Friday in Los Angeles County stumping for Hillary Clinton — a full-court pressure move in an area of the state that will be critical for the Democratic presidential front-ruer and her opponent, Sen. Beie Sanders.
In the moing, Clinton kicked things off in Burbank before about 150 supporters at the Olive Recreation Center, giving a 40-minute speech that was heavy on policy, light on jabs at opponents and loaded with praise for his wife.
But first things first — he urged the crowd to vote in Tuesday’s Califoia primary.
“A lot of people believe this election is over,” Clinton said. “It is not.”
Looking casual in a blue sport coat and jeans, he stood on a stage while the crowd stood under shade trees that kept things from getting too hot, even as the temperature edged toward 90 degrees.
The Clinton campaign has been feeling the heat as well, with some recent polls showing Sanders and Clinton neck-and-neck in search of capturing a chunk of the state’s 475 delegates.
While the former secretary of state rarely mentions Sanders’ name in her speeches and instead trains her attacks largely on the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee, Donald Trump, Bill Clinton did take on both Sanders and Trump.
He singled Trump out first, saying he was a “harsher and cruder” version of a debate going on around the world.
“We have a choice to make — we can lead our country and the world away from these kinds of politics toward an inclusive future where we have less inequality, more upward mobility and higher incomes because we work together,” he said, “or where we’re just going to build more walls instead of bridges.”
Clinton eaed applause from the crowd for explaining his wife’s plan to allow student debt to be refinanced and to expand Pell grants, and he questioned Sanders’ repeated calls for free college tuition. “It sounds really good to say, “Let’s give everybody free tuition,” he said, adding that the cost burden on states would make it unfeasible.
“I don’t think Califoia could do that,” he said.
Clinton reached back into the past in his speech as well, telling the crowd how the former first lady led the charge on health care reform and how she worked with Republicans like U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham and John McCain while she was one of New York’s senators.
Javier Silva, a 24-year-old from Burbank, shook hands with Clinton after his speech and said the Democratic front-ruer was appealing because of her pragmatism.
“Beie Sanders is more of the ideal,” Silva said. “But unless they elect an entirely Democratic Congress, he won’t be able to get anything done.”
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The Burbank visit was just the start of a very busy day. Clinton was also slated to get out the vote in Pacoima, Woodland Hills and Santa Monica.
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نویسنده: جمشید رضایی