History as Clinton ascends to nomination

First lady gives heartfelt endorsement Backlash raises questions

PHILADELPHIA, July 26, (Agencies): A glass ceiling is shattering at the Democratic National Convention as Hillary Clinton ascends to the presidential nomination with Tuesday’s roll call of the states, making her the first woman to lead a major party into a White House race.

Clinton’s campaign hoped to use the history-making moment to bolster the candidate’s popularity — mindful that while many voters are happy to be nominating a woman, they’re not wild about this particular woman candidate. Former President Bill Clinton and other speakers will offer prime-time testimonials to her career highlights and advocacy, hoping to soften her image and resistance to her bid.

But as history is being made, hostility is being heard, too. Bernie Sanders’ primary challenge has unleashed vitriol toward the party establishment that Sanders himself has been unable to rein in. His supporters spent much of Monday protesting his treatment by the party, even booing Clinton’s name.

What was expected to be a tightly orchestrated convention, run with all the professionalism and experience that were lacking at Trump’s often-chaotic affair in Ohio, instead showed its rough edges in the early going, starting with chants of “Bernie” during the opening invocation and boos at numerous mentions of Clinton’s name.

First lady Michelle Obama gave a heartfelt endorsement of the candidate who engaged her husband in a fierce struggle for the nomination in 2008. “I trust Hillary to lead this country,” she said in a speech that provided a parent’s-eye view of the White House and its power.

Frustration

Liberal favorite Elizabeth Warren, senator from Massachusetts, and Sanders himself also gave the party something to cheer about Monday night.

While Mrs. Obama has often avoided overt politics, her frustration with Trump’s rise was evident. Without naming him, she warned that the White House couldn’t be in the hands of someone with “a thin skin or a tendency to lash out” or someone who tells voters the country can be great again. “This right now, is the greatest country on earth,” she said.

Sanders took the stage to a sustained roar and shouts of “We love you, Bernie.” Some of his supporters were in tears.

While asserting “our revolution continues,” the Vermont senator implored his restive followers to get behind Clinton. On issues of poverty, immigration, environmental protection and more, he said, Clinton’s election counts. “If you don’t believe that this election is important,” he said, “take a moment to think about the Supreme Court justices that Donald Trump would nominate.”

Some delegates said the messages PHILADELPHIA, July 26, (RTRS): It should have been a triumphant night for Hillary Clinton when her rival Bernie Sanders gave a rousing speech urging his supporters to vote for her in the Nov 8 US presidential election.

Instead it turned into a sign of potential trouble for her White House bid. His speech on Monday to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia urging the party to unite against Republican Donald Trump was met with some jeers when he endorsed Clinton - a sign he had lost control of his own movement.

“I’m beyond disappointed,” California delegate Aleece Depuey, 49, said after Sanders sought to rally support for his one-time rival.

Hundreds of Sanders supporters marched through the streets on Day One of the four-day convention, chanting: “We want Bernie!” Delegates wore “Bernie or Bust” buttons. Others donned Robin Hood-style hats, a call to redistribute wealth from the rich to the poor.

When he spoke, a scuffle broke out between a Sanders supporter and a Clinton supporter in the hall.

The backlash raised questions over whether - and how - Clinton could ever win over Sanders supporters.

With opinion polls showing the Clinton-Trump race tightening, Clinton needs Sanders’ voters more than ever. Sanders, a US

did the trick.

“As the night went on, we saw a party grow stronger,” South Carolina delegate Boyd Brown said after the first day speeches.

Where Monday’s opening night lineup showcased diversity — with black, Hispanic, gay and disabled speakers — Tuesday’s program will undoubtedly play up Clinton’s historical milestone and make an overt appeal to women voters who see it as long overdue.

Trump seemed to acknowledge Clinton’s edge with female voters.

“Fifty percent of our country is men, where I’m doing very well,” he began in remarks Monday night in North Carolina. “That’s the good news. Let me give you the bad news: The women. I don’t know what’s going on with the women here. But I think, I think I’m doing well with the women.”

Clinton was firmly on track to write the next chapter of a story that left off in 2008, when she conceded the Democratic presidential race to Barack Obama in a speech that lamented “we senator from Vermont, arrived in Philadelphia with 1,894 of 4,763 delegates after winning 13 million votes in the Democratic nominating contest.

To many of Sanders’ backers, Clinton is a bridge too far. They see her as the kind of political insider, backed by reams of corporate money, that drove them to Sanders and his fight to rein in Wall Street and remove income inequality. Others simply do not trust her, opinion polls show.

Backers

In a Reuters/Ipsos poll released at the end of June, some 15 percent of Sanders’ backers said they would vote for Trump, and 19 percent would support neither Clinton nor Trump.

Sanders won the states of Colorado, Indiana, Michigan, and New Hampshire in the run-up to the convention, and nearly won Iowa - all states that could be closely contested by Trump in the general election. Clinton likely will need some portion of Sanders’ support to stay competitive in those states.

Clinton’s campaign had hoped in Philadelphia to put the bare-knuckle primary fight behind it, but Sanders’ voters were enraged by Friday’s embarrassing release of internal party emails by the activist group WikiLeaks showing party officials clearly favored Clinton

weren’t able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time,” but added proudly, “it’s got about 18 million cracks in it,” a tally of her primary votes.

Roll

The roll call, when each state announces its delegate totals from the primary season, will affirm a nomination Clinton locked up weeks ago. One question of the day was whether Sanders would press for a count by all the states, as his delegates want, or interrupt the process to ask that her nomination be approved by acclamation. That’s what Clinton did on Obama’s behalf in 2008 to indicate their rivalry was truly over.

Nomination sealed, the Clinton campaign planned to turn to a Day 2 program dubbed “Fights of Her Life,” highlighting her advocacy for children, health care and Sept. 11 recovery efforts, the campaign said.

The speakers also will include the so-called “mothers of the movement” — the mothers of Eric Garner and over their candidate.

Sanders supporters seemed to be everywhere, often with a bigger presence than Clinton supporters, a jarring sight at an event where she is due to be formally nominated as the party’s presidential candidate.

At a delegate welcoming event on Sunday night, shouts of “Bernie!” filled the air as his supporters circulated a petition to force convention organizers to hold an extended rollcall vote on the floor this week that would require each delegate to declare his or her support.

Others pledged to contest Clinton’s choice of Democrat Tim Kaine, a US senator from Virginia, as her running mate.

When at mid-day Sanders addressed more than a thousand of his delegates at the city’s convention center, the crowd erupted in fury when he asked them to switch their allegiance to Clinton.

“Brothers and sisters,” he said over their jeers, “this is the real world that we live in. Trump is a bully and a demagogue.” People started shouting back: “So is Hillary!”

Sanders did not mention Clinton again. But he already had lost the attention of some of his most fervent fans.

“As soon as he said back Clinton, everyone stopped listening,” said Cindy Melchert, a protester who listened to the appeal over a loudspeaker at a local park.

Michael Brown, black men whose deaths at the hands of police helped spawn the Black Lives Matter protests.

The moment will not be without controversy: Philadelphia’s police union complained that Clinton was showcasing killings by police without giving equal time to the families of fallen officers. Clinton’s campaign responded that two members of law enforcement also are on the convention schedule. Support Bill Clinton was once the Democrats explainer-in-chief, electrifying the convention crowd with his support of President Barack Obama.

Today, he increasingly seems to be explaining himself.

In the four years since the party’s last national convention, the center of gravity in Democratic politics has shifted decidedly to the left. Clinton must finesse some of his administration’s biggest achievements, including a landmark free trade agreement and major criminal justice law, lest his wife pay the price with the party’s emboldened liberal base.