McCaskill: Clinton should be more careful in how she describes Trump voters – By Julia Manchester (thehill.com) / March 25 2018
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) said in an interview on Sunday that former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton needs to be more careful in how she describes President Trump’s voters.
“For those of us that are in states that Trump won we would really appreciate if she would be more careful and show respect to every American voter and not just the ones who voted for her,” McCaskill told MSNBC’s Kasie Hunt.
“I understand the point she was trying to make, but it felt like she was criticizing Missouri voters,” she said.
“I would draw a line there. I have great respect for Missouri voters, and there were a lot reasons why they voted for Donald Trump, some of them I understand,” she said.
Trump won McCaskill’s home state of Missouri in the 2016 presidential election.
Clinton garnered backlash earlier this month after she described areas that voted for Trump during a recent address in India.
“If you look at the map of the United States, there’s all that red in the middle where Trump won,” Clinton said. “I won the places that are optimistic, diverse, dynamic, moving forward. And his whole campaign, ‘Make America Great Again,’ was looking backwards,” she continued.
“You didn’t like black people getting rights, you don’t like women, you know, getting jobs. You don’t want, you know, to see that Indian-American succeeding more than you are. Whatever your problem is … working for a woman now, you don’t like it.
Whatever the reason was, he stirred that up.”
McCaskill’s potential Republican 2018 challenger seized on Clinton’s remarks and tied them to McCaskill and her support of Clinton in a recent campaign ad.
“In Claire McCaskill’s America…Hillary is the president. Senator McCaskill led the Hillary coalition. And what does Hillary Clinton think about us?” the ad says, before playing Clinton’s remarks.
McCaskill also spoke out against Clinton’s remarks earlier this month.
“Those are kind of fighting words for me, because I’m partial to Missouri voters,” she said.
“I think they were expressing their frustration with the status quo. I may not have agreed with their choice, but I certainly respect them. And I don’t think that’s the way you should talk about any voter, especially ones in my state.”
