Bill Clinton threw Bernie Sanders under the bus
By Marisa Schultz
October 4, 2016 | 2:37pm
Modal Trigger 
Bill Clinton (left) and Bernie Sanders Photo: Getty Images
WASHINGTON — Bill Clinton threw Bernie Sanders under the bus in an impromptu response to a heckler at Ohio University on Tuesday as he defended his controversial 1994 crime bill.
Trying to woo young voters in a key swing state, Clinton was interrupted by a protester shouting he cannot vote for someone who sends thousands of people to prison.
“Hillary didn’t vote for the ’94 crime bill even though Sen. Sanders did,” the former president shot back, as a heckler was removed from the rally.Bubba’s remark to highlight divisions between his wife and Sanders won’t do much to build their alliance — especially as Sanders has been diligently campaigning for Hillary Clinton, trying to convince his young supporters to back Clinton and move past their feelings of being shunned by the DNC and the Clinton campaign during the primary.
The former president said it was his wife who was the first candidate to speak up about changing incarceration policies.
“The facts are difficult there,” Clinton said in his rebuttal. “You ought to think about it, if you’re really upset, that means you’re also upset that we had a 25-year low in the crime rate, a 33-year low in the murder rate, and listen to this, a 67-year low in the rate of people being killed by illegal gun violence. I’m pretty proud of that, and I think that was worth fighting for.”
It’s the second day in a row that Clinton sparked divisions with Democratic allies. On Monday in Michigan, Bill knocked President Obama’s health care plan as the “craziest thing in the world.”
Clinton toned down his health care rhetoric Tuesday and kept more in line with his wife’s policy that ObamaCare is a positive first step but needs improving.
“The affordable health care act did a world of good and the 50-something efforts to repeal it that the Republicans have staged were a terrible mistake,” Clinton said.
“… But there’s a group of people — mostly small-business owners, and employees who make just a little too much money to qualify for Medicaid expansion or for the tax incentives — who can’t get affordable health insurance premiums in a lot of places … She has proposed to take the next step in this and do what the president tried to do the first time and she supported, which is to allow people 55 and over to buy into Medicare and allow others to have a public option that looks like expansion of Medicaid they can afford. It’s the right thing to do.”
Sanders campaigns for Hillary Clinton in Minnesota later Tuesday.
Share this:
Filed under 2016 election , bernie sanders , bill clinton , democratic national committee , hillary clinton |
