Supporters of Hillary Clinton are focusing attention on her potential to become the first woman president as the former first lady launches her highly anticipated bid for the White House.
Her status as a grandmother to Chelsea Clinton’s daughter, Charlotte, has also featured prominently in discussions of her emerging candidacy.
Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., joked Sunday that being a fellow member of the “Grandma’s Club” would shape Clinton’s campaign vision.
“It’s about what’s going to be there for our grandchildren,” Stabenow said on CNN’s State of the Union.
A March Gallup poll suggested the top selling point of a Hillary Clinton candidacy is the fact that she would be the first female president. It ranked well above her foreign policy experience or likability.
In an interview published just a couple of days before her mother’s announcement, Chelsea Clinton said she believes simply electing a woman president would help further gender equality nationwide.
“When you ask about the importance of having a woman president, absolutely it’s important, for, yes, symbolic reasons — symbols are important; it is important who and what we choose to elevate, and to celebrate,” the younger Clinton told Elle magazine.
Former Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu joined the chorus of Democrats touting Hillary Clinton’s position as a female role model.
“She’s really been a remarkable leader for women, not just in the United States, but all around the world,” said Landrieu Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “She listens. She’s strong when necessary, but soft when you have to be to bring people along.”
Sen. Rand Paul, a candidate for the GOP nomination, said Sunday he sees a conflict between Hillary Clinton’s appeal to women and the donors to her family’s charity.
“I think the problem will be, with that line, is that she’s taken money from countries that abuse the rights of women,” Paul said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “It’s going to be hard for her to say she’s for women’s rights, when she’s accepting money from sort of stone-age sort of regimes that really abuse the rights of women.”
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., said Hillary Clinton’s past support of women’s rights would overshadow any such criticisms.
“I think you’ve seen other foundations take similar contributions,” Klobuchar said Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
“I don’t think anybody can match [Clinton’s] record” on women’s rights, she noted.
Paul said he would not approach debates with Hillary Clinton differently just because she is a woman.
“I’m always polite. I don’t get out of control,” Paul said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “I would treat her with the same respect that I would treat a man.
“I think that would be a sexist response to say, ‘Oh, my goodness, she deserves not to be treated as aggressively, because she’s only a woman,’ ” he noted.
A group of unaffiliated Clinton supporters called the “HRC Super Volunteers” circulated a list of sexist words to reporters last month in an effort to pre-empt any potentially “sexist” coverage of the former secretary of state.
Among the words they urged journalists to avoid was “ambitious,” “insincere,” and “entitled.”
Days before the expected launch of her campaign, Hillary Clinton released an updated epilogue to her memoir, Hard Choices, that focused heavily on her role as a mother and grandmother.
The epilogue includes details from her family history, such as the Lamaze classes she and Bill Clinton took while pregnant with Chelsea, the delivery room scene when Charlotte was born and the new outlook Hillary Clinton said she has adopted since the birth of her granddaughter.
“Becoming a grandmother has made me think deeply about the responsibility we all share as stewards of the world we inherit and will one day pass on,” Clinton wrote in the epilogue, which is slated to appear in the paperback version of the book later this month. “Rather than make me want to slow down, it has spurred me to speed up.”
