Less than 100 days out from South Caroline’s first-in-the-South Democratic primary, all three of the party’s presidential candidates gathered here Saturday to make their pitch to hundreds of activists at the state’s annual Blue Jamboree on the banks of the Ashley River.
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Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton will on Sunday propose a tax credit offsetting up to $6,000 in costs associated with caring for elderly and disabled family members, and allowing caregivers to accrue Social Security retirement benefits for such work. And a few Democratic superdelegates, whose backing is crucial, said Clinton’s ties to big banks, and her invocation of 9/11 to defend her ties to Wall Street at the November 14 debate, only made them further question her independence from the financial industry. At least one woman was convinced, stenciling O’Malley’s name in lipstick on a sign after discarding her Clinton placard.
“I go after not just the banks”, Clinton told the crowd.
By attacking Sanders from the right on health care and economic policy, along with reminding the left how hawkish she is in her recent speech at the Council on Foreign Relations, Clinton risks seeing progressive voters refuse to vote for her.
Sanders is using a jam-packed, three-day stop in the Palmetto State to try to bolster support among African-American voters, a demographic that he’s losing sharply to Hillary Clinton.
“We started way, way, way down”, the Vermont senator told reporters while campaigning in North Charleston, South Carolina.
Democrats and Democrat-leaners surveyed were asked whether Clinton or Sanders has better credentials across 15 different categories ranging from addressing global warming to dealing with Russias Vladimir Putin.
“Our daughter is madly insane about Bernie Sanders and she said, ‘Mom you’ve gotta go, ‘” Jones said. “That’s why we support improved Medicare for all, and that’s why I support Bernie Sanders”, said NNU Co-President Jean Ross, RN.
“We can manage to do that while preserving the accomplishment of the Affordable Care Act”, she said.
Speaking to reporters earlier, Sanders was more direct, saying that he was “disappointed” that Clinton would not back a system that would “save middle-class families thousands and thousands of dollars a year”.
Junius Paul Wright III, a high school teacher in Charleston, said he has been waiting for a candidate like Sanders, a self-described “democratic socialist.”
Heather Jones, a graphic designer from Daniel Island who owns her own business, came to the event as an undecided voter but walked away as an O’Malley supporter.
On Saturday, O’Malley flatly said his campaign was not taking on debt to pay for travel and staff.
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“For a long time watching the national news I’m sure you thought you only had two choices”, he said.
