Hillary Clinton’s search for a vice president started with a commanding victory in the NY primary and a special delivery in a plastic Duane Reed bag. Tim Kaine, to a Miami audience Saturday as “a progressive who likes to get things done”.
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“He is qualified to step into this job and lead on day one”, Clinton said of Kaine.
“The mood of the country is a populist one”, said Stephanie Taylor, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee in reacting to the selection.
Mr Kaine, 58, is a Harvard-trained lawyer, who cut his political teeth as mayor of Richmond, Virginia.
“I’ve never lost an election”, he said to applause.
At a rally in Miami on July 23, Clinton praised Kaine as the antithesis of the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
“He fights for the people he represents, and he delivers real results”, Clinton said, applying one of her favourite self-descriptions to him. The two only briefly posed for photos at their campaign kickoff.
Shortly after Clinton announced her running mate on Twitter on Friday, Republican Sen.
“America was not built on fear”.
Widely seen as a safe choice in a brutal election race – Kaine himself jokes that he is “boring” – the senator could help Clinton lock in two key voting blocs: Hispanics and his battleground home state.
“And when a gunman killed 32 people on the campus of Virginia Tech (in 2007), Tim knew he had a responsibility as governor to offer more than thoughts and prayers to the community he mourned with – and as a gun owner, he stood up to the gun lobby on their behalf”.
“Make no mistake, behind that smile, Tim also has a backbone of steel”, Clinton said. “Just ask the (National Rifle Association)”.
Virginia Senator and now Democratic vice-president hopeful Tim Kaine. The pick also comes as leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee show there were discussions among top party officials about how to attack the Vermont senator, a development sure to anger his followers whom Clinton is now counting on. Obama considered him for vice president a year later. “He leaves a trail of broken promises and wrecked lives wherever he goes”, said Kaine.
He pointed out that his father-in-law was a Republican governor of Virginia who had integrated the public schools.
Holton, who wiped away tears during the speech, is the state’s education secretary and a former state judge.
They have three grown-up children called Nat, Woody and Annella. The couple planned to attend 9 a.m. Catholic Mass. He said they shared a common creed: “Do all the good you can”.
As a validator, defender, kindred spirit and attack dog, Kaine wove deftly between humor and dire warnings about the Republican ticket, impressing the crowd and leaving Clinton looking genuinely happy and relaxed.
Trump tweeted that Kaine “has been praising the Trans Pacific Partnership and has been pushing hard to get it approved”.
While Kaine has a record of fighting for a number of progressive causes, like fair housing and gun control, he has also supported the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact with Pacific Rim nations that is a major flash point with the left and also opposed by Trump. Her campaign team believes Kaine’s bilingual skills and affinity for Hispanic culture can help the Democratic Party register and motivate voters to participate in November. “Bernie fought for nothing!”
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Kaine is viewed skeptically by some liberals, who dislike his 2015 vote to provide the president with “fast-track authority” on trade deals and recent stances on Wall Street regulations, including rules governing regional banks.
