Chelsea Clinton hails JK Rowling – then blasts telly addict Trump

BY ANNA BURNSIDE would understand. I hope it will resonate with every child – she was rejected this many times but, wow, she kept going.

“I also thought that not just girls, but boys too, would be astonished that she was advised to disguise herself. I thought that would really resonate with kids.”

Chelsea was 12 when her dad was elected US president. She was at her mum’s side during the last presidential campaign when she crossed the country campaigning against Donald Trump.

Yet there are no elected politicians in her book of inspirational footballers, ballerinas, scientists and lawyers.

She said: “It was not a conscious choice although I think it’s pretty obvious that I think who runs for office and who holds office matters a tremendous amount.”

And if she writes a follow-up, she might look to Holyrood for inspiration, saying: “I think you have more than one candidate for inclusion here. Maybe in the future.”

Chelsea, who is in Edinburgh for two sold-out events at the International Book Festival, is also impressed, and envious, of our First Minister, who appears at book festivals, promotes reading to children and clearly loves reading.

She said: “It’s important that she appreciates books and talks about them. That’s something President Obama did, that my father did. Now we have the antithesis of that, we have a president who talks about what cable news channels he’s consumed on any given day. That’s such a big difference.

“It’s something we should expect of our leaders, that they have a curiosity about the world, and that one of the ways to engage that is through books.”

Chelsea’s book is about women from around the world with ambitions who did not let anyone put them off. She stands by the importance of this message, even if it involves the gruelling experience her mum went through standing for election.

Hillary Clinton won more actual votes than Trump but didn’t get enough support in the key states to win in the US electoral college system. It was a rough campaign, with repeated calls for Clinton to be jailed