Former GOP senator and independent governor of Rhode Island Lincoln Chafee on Sunday attacked Hillary Clinton, whom he is challenging for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Speaking to CNN, Chafee said Clinton achieved “precious few” accomplishments as secretary of state and was “too close to the neocons.”
He made it plain that his line of attack against Clinton would be that her vote for the Iraq war demonstrated a “lack of judgement.”
Chafee, the one Republican senator to vote against the Iraq war, said there had been the possibility of a period of lasting peace at the time Congress voted for war, “if we made the right decisions.”
He said the justifications for war were flimsy, but Clinton “didn’t do her homework, and we are living with the consequences today.”
Chafee was breezy about his transition across the political spectrum, saying it was not he but the Republican Party that had changed. He assailed Clinton from the left and pointedly described Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts as “absolutely right about what’s happening to the middle class,” adding, “she has been a prophet.”
He made a direct pitch for her backing, saying he would like Warren’s support for his presidential bid, and he would like her followers, too.
Asked whether he was definitely in the White House race, Chafee stopped short of a definite commitment, saying there was a process to go through. But he added: “Yes, I want to be there in November, December, January, debating the issues.”
