I wrote the below piece yesterday, having attended the Suffolk County Dems spring dinner Monday night on assignment for The New York Times. (This did not run in the paper and was not published on the website -- it's an almost-web piece that became less relevant as Clinton made more and more stops and was therefore not published.)
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At a Suffolk County Democratic Committee fundraising dinner that broke attendance records on Monday night— 850 attendees and over $1.5 million in raised funds — Hillary Clinton wavered between stroking fear about America's future if a Republican is elected, and presenting herself as best prepared to extinguish the crackling fire.
Mrs. Clinton described Ted Cruz and Donald J. Trump as having ideas that were “not only offensive,” but “dangerous.”
She emphasized contrast between her campaign and the campaign of the Republican Party, but also took a jab at Senator Bernie Sanders on gun control saying the issue was “one of the biggest differences in this primary.” She warned voters that Trump’s comments about Muslims have been showing up on terrorist websites and blogs, for use as recruiting tools, a claim she made in a Democratic debate last year that was widely disputed.
“When you have Republicans calling for walls and mass arrests and deportations and surveillance, and you have Trump playing coy with the KKK — when you have this kind of atmosphere being created — we have to be very firm and strong in rejecting it; because it does make us less secure," Mrs. Clinton said.
The dinner capped a long day of campaigning in New York, the day's activities ranging from dropping in at an Indian restaurant in Jackson Heights Queens, to talking about gun violence in Port Washington, N.Y. On Tuesday, she held a roundtable about equal pay for women in Manhattan before flying to Florida for fundraisers.
But on Monday night, surrounded by prominent New York Democrats, she stood at the podium to offer comforting words consistent with the public image she has curated of late: new grandma, believer in all things American, believer in humankind.
To cheers and clapping, in a room full of supporters who paid $300 each to hear her words, Mrs. Clinton told voters that the country must rebuild faith in its government, political system and economy. Otherwise, she said, Americans will no longer “recognize this country that we love.”
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At a Suffolk County Democratic Committee fundraising dinner that broke attendance records on Monday night— 850 attendees and over $1.5 million in raised funds — Hillary Clinton wavered between stroking fear about America's future if a Republican is elected, and presenting herself as best prepared to extinguish the crackling fire.
Mrs. Clinton described Ted Cruz and Donald J. Trump as having ideas that were “not only offensive,” but “dangerous.”
She emphasized contrast between her campaign and the campaign of the Republican Party, but also took a jab at Senator Bernie Sanders on gun control saying the issue was “one of the biggest differences in this primary.” She warned voters that Trump’s comments about Muslims have been showing up on terrorist websites and blogs, for use as recruiting tools, a claim she made in a Democratic debate last year that was widely disputed.
“When you have Republicans calling for walls and mass arrests and deportations and surveillance, and you have Trump playing coy with the KKK — when you have this kind of atmosphere being created — we have to be very firm and strong in rejecting it; because it does make us less secure," Mrs. Clinton said.
The dinner capped a long day of campaigning in New York, the day's activities ranging from dropping in at an Indian restaurant in Jackson Heights Queens, to talking about gun violence in Port Washington, N.Y. On Tuesday, she held a roundtable about equal pay for women in Manhattan before flying to Florida for fundraisers.
But on Monday night, surrounded by prominent New York Democrats, she stood at the podium to offer comforting words consistent with the public image she has curated of late: new grandma, believer in all things American, believer in humankind.
To cheers and clapping, in a room full of supporters who paid $300 each to hear her words, Mrs. Clinton told voters that the country must rebuild faith in its government, political system and economy. Otherwise, she said, Americans will no longer “recognize this country that we love.”
