CLAREMONT, N.H. — In the battered mill town where he convened with then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich two decades to discuss money in politics, former President Bill Clinton touted his wife’s support for campaign finance.
“[Hillary] wants to repeal Citizens United,” he told dozens of voters packed into a restaurant and inn on the banks of the Sugar River. “She is committed to laws that disclose money.”
The former president arrived in Claremont for the second of three campaign stops in the Granite State Wednesday, where he made a pitch for his wife’s “inclusive economic and social policy,” and where the former secretary of state faces a serious challenge from Bernie Sanders. Wall Street and campaign finance reform are two areas where Sanders tends to attack the Democratic front-runner.
“[Hillary’s] financial plan was reviewed by Barney Frank, Paul Krugman and Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio,” Clinton boasted. “They reviewed everybody’s plans [and] they all said hers was the best.”
“In Hillary’s words,” Clinton continued, her economic plan is for “the struggling, the surviving and the successful.”
Clinton packed his speech Wednesday with personal anecdotes and praise for his wife’s accomplishments, leaving criticism of Sanders and the Republican presidential field to the former first lady and their daughter, Chelsea, who was stumping for her mother in nearby Portsmouth just 24 hours prior.
“I always say, our whole family, including our daughter… we think it all starts with how you keep score,” he told the crowd towards the beginning of his remarks. “We keep score all of us the same way: Are people better off when you quit than when you started? Are our children better off today? And are people coming together rather than being torn apart?”
While Hillary continues to fend off attacks on her record as secretary of state — Clinton says politics “is not like baseball [where] you get credit for saves” — her husband assured voters Wednesday evening that she has a long history of accomplishments that qualify her for the Oval Office.
“Everything in her life she touched, she made better,” Clinton told voters, a claim he’s repeated several times since he began campaigning on his wife’s behalf. “She’s the best change agent I ever saw.”
