Democrats move toward unity on historic night for Clinton
Hillary Clinton the fighter, yes. But also Hillary Clinton the empathizer who held the bandaged hand of a 9/11 burn victim, the listener who counselled the anguished mothers of slain black children, the friend who played a giddy game of mermaid with a little girl in a swimming pool.
That Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton said Tuesday night, is “the real one.”
On the day Hillary Clinton became the first woman to win the presidential nomination of a major American party, she used almost an entire day of the Democratic National Convention to try to solve the dire problem that threatens to keep her from making history again in November: Americans just don’t like her.
It was an attempt at a wholesale reintroduction of a former secretary of state, senator and first lady who has been in the national spotlight for 25 years.
Speaker after speaker offered up the kind of personal anecdotes that were largely missing from last week’s Republican convention, seeking to show the softer, selfless side of a guarded woman whose private life remains a mystery for much of the country.
Story night was capped, naturally, by a typically freewheeling and lengthy address by her raconteur husband, the former U.S. president.
Bill Clinton contrasted Republicans’ “made-up,” “cartoon” portrayal of his wife with the one he sees — the one who “calls you when you’re sick,” who founded a legal-aid clinic in impoverished Arkansas, who didn’t want to leave after dropping their daughter off at college.
“She’s insatiably curious, she’s a natural leader, she’s a good organizer, and she is the best darn change-maker I have ever met in my entire life,” Bill Clinton said. In an aside that summed up the subtext of the night, he said, “You should never judge a book by its cover.”
Clinton clinched her victory somewhat anticlimactically, with the votes of the South Dakota delegation. But in a gesture of unity and grace, defeated rival Bernie Sanders took the microphone at the end of the voting to ask that Clinton be acclaimed as the winner.
“I move that Hillary Clinton be selected as the nominee of the Democratic Party for president of the United States,” Sanders, visibly moved, said to raucous applause.
Dozens of his most devoted supporters walked out of the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia and protested outside. But the general mood was festive, even before the hit song “Happy” came over the loudspeakers, as Sanders backers who appeared restive on Monday united with Clinton’s backers in celebrating the landmark achievement.
Clinton was not in the room, but the moment was laden with emotion. Jerry Emmett, a 102-year-old born before women were granted the right to vote, beamed and trembled with delight as she announced Arizona’s votes.”
“Arizona casts 34 votes for Senator Sanders,” she said. “And 51 votes for the next president of the United States of America — Hillary Rodham Clinton!”
The second day of the four-day gathering was designed to address Clinton’s dreadful and declining reputation on matters of character and personality. It was a night aimed, in essence, of getting more voters to contemplate her as a lifelong friend, “Hill.”
Opinion polls suggest Clinton is seen to be far more knowledgeable and qualified than Republican nominee Donald Trump. But she is also viewed as dishonest, untrustworthy and generally unlikeable.
The Clinton campaign did not leave the humanization work to Bill. Perhaps the most powerful testimonial was delivered by Lauren Manning, the businesswoman whose body was covered with burns on 9/11. Clinton, she said, held her hand and helped her through her pain.
“I trusted her when my life was on the line, and she came through,” she said. “Not for the cameras, not because anyone was watching, but because that’s who she is: kind, caring, loyal. “She had my back.” The mothers of black people killed by police and in high-profile killings, including Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin and Eric Garner, spoke of Clinton’s respect for their pain.
“I am here with Hillary Clinton tonight because she is a leader, and a mother, who will say our children’s names,” said a tearful Geneva ReedVeal, the mother of Sandra Bland, who died in what authorities said was a suicide after she was taken into custody following a traffic stop in Texas.
The women were introduced as the “mothers of the movement” — the Black Lives Matter movement. Their very presence was notable, given the unpopularity of Black Lives Matter with many independents and conservatives, and another indication of the Democrats’ increasing assertiveness on matters of race and criminal justice.
“Black lives matter! Black lives matter!” the crowd chanted. The Republican convention crowd had chanted “all lives matter,” a kind of rebuke.
The effort to occasionally humanize seemed strained. Alison Lundergan Grimes, Kentucky’s secretary of state, said Clinton was the first person to call her when her grandmothers died. She then added: “She can devour Buffalo wings whether on a car, plane or train!”
“I remember her playing mermaid in the pool with our youngest daughter, Sally, for hours on family vacations,” said Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe. “She was the first to call and congratulate our oldest son, Jack, when he began his career as an officer in the Marine Corps. And she and Bill didn’t hesitate to travel through a blizzard to be with our family at my father’s funeral.”
New York Sen. Chuck Schumer attempted to confront Clinton’s trust issues, which have been exacerbated by the email scandal that has dogged her campaign for an entire year. Schumer told a story about Clinton’s work to help a male factory worker worried about his plant shutting down — the type of voter with whom she is doing the worst.
“I’m from Brooklyn. It’s in our blood to sniff out bull. There’s a lot of that in politics, but there’s not an ounce of it in Hillary Clinton,” Schumer said. “When she tells you something, take it to the bank.”
The Democrats attempted to strike a largely positive tone, though they could not refrain entirely from mocking Republican nominee Donald Trump. Actor Elizabeth Banks, one of several female celebrities on the roster of speakers, walked out on stage as Trump did at his convention: through a purple fog to the tune of “We Are The Champions.”
Former secretary of state Madeleine Albright slammed Trump on foreign policy, warning of the grave danger of his friendliness to Russia’s Vladimir Putin. And Georgia Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights icon, invoked the threat of Trump in his nominating address, referring to unnamed “forces” seeking to take the country back 50 years.
“We are not going back!” he said. Donna Brazile, the interim party chair, repeated the same phrase: “As long as she’s in charge, we’re never going back. And that’s why I’m with her.”