In a vulgar, deprecating comment, former President Bill Clinton said his wife’s 2016 campaign failed to communicate with voters, according to a new book.
The passage in “The Squad: AOC and the Hope of a Political Revolution” by Ryan Grim was reported by Fox News.
“Former president Bill Clinton, surveying the landscape and the ham-handed efforts at identity politics, was bereft, lamenting to a longtime friend in the fall of 2016 that Hillary’s campaign ‘could not sell p**** on a troop train,’” Grim wrote.
The book “Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign,” earlier noted that the former president’s advice was disregarded by his wife, according to ABC.
Journalist Jonathan Allen, who wrote the book with journalist Amie Parnes, said Bill Clinton wanted to go to places Hillary Clinton’s team did not think were worth their while.
“He thought, these eggheads don’t really know politics. They don’t understand persuasion,” Allen said.
He said, Bill Clinton wanted his wife’s campaign to hit suburban and rural areas even when Hillary Clinton might not be likely to win a majority of votes there.
“He knew there was some power just in showing up,” Allen said.
Allen said that due to criticism over his role in the 2008 campaign Hillary Clinton lost to former President Barack Obama, Bill Clinton did not force his views on the campaign “because he didn’t want to be blamed for defeating his wife again.”
Was Bill Clinton right about his wife’s 2016 campaign?
As the 2024 campaign nears, Hillary Clinton is emerging as “one of the most prominent and influential surrogates in Biden’s re-election effort,” according to NBC.
One source NBC did not name said President Joe Biden needs allies.
“At the end of the day, Biden needs all the help that he can get,” a Democratic strategist said, speaking on condition of anonymity to talk openly about Biden’s prospects. “What he needs is both the spirit and the actual reality of unity.”
“I don’t know of a couple that could be any more helpful to President Biden than the Clintons,” said Tom Daschle, a former Senate Democratic leader. “They have an enormous level of support and admiration within the Democratic Party.”
Not everyone agrees. In an Op-Ed for MSNBC, Zeeshan Aleem said Hillary Clinton has shortcomings.
“Relying on Clinton as a high-profile surrogate is a risky proposition,” Aleem wrote.
“She lost the election not only after having lost millions of Obama voters to Trump — many of them white working-class voters whom Biden partially won back — but also by failing to inspire many of them to vote at all,” Aleem wrote.
“In a tight race in which Biden is facing off against the same candidate she lost to, she’s far from an ideal campaign attack dog,” Aleem added.
