Chelsea Clinton steps up campaign role

CNN: Chelsea Clinton steps up role
January 24, 2008


Chelsea Clinton is stepping up her role on the campaign trail.

CNN) — For months, Chelsea Clinton was a silent presence on the campaign trail as her parents commanded center stage. But since voting began, she’s begun to take tentative steps on the trail on her own, at events where she commands solo billing – without her mother, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, or her father, former President Bill Clinton. She’s visited campaign offices and casinos, cafes and even a cosmetology school.

Wednesday night, she campaigned for her mother at Spelman College in Atlanta, a historically black women’s college – at a time when her mother is in a critical battle for black women voters.

"I want you to think of me as your peer, even though I am 27," Chelsea Clinton told the college students. "I want to talk to you about why you should vote for my mom." The younger Clinton – who has been a much more low-key trail presence than her famous parents – took questions on topics as varied the environment, health care, government spending and waste. She discussed her own work experiences, saying "I work in finance, I am a numbers dork." But she also ventured away from the safest topics, endorsing condom distribution in schools, and telling the crowd she was proud of her mother for fighting for over-the-counter distribution of the morning-after pill.

Black women are a key voting bloc in many upcoming Democratic primaries, and Hillary Clinton has been in a battle for their votes with her chief presidential rival, Barack Obama. "I don't think you should vote for her or against her because she is a woman," but because she’s been "working on these challenges for more than 25 years."

"I think she came off very down to earth, she answered and welcomed everyone's question and I really appreciated that." said Spelman junior Janelle Richards. The former First Daughter even made a stop in the school cafeteria, walking by tables and introducing herself to students as they were eating. At a later stop at downtown Atlanta’s Luckie Lounge one supporter asked her to reveal something that nobody else knew about her. Chelsea responded that she’d love to — if all the cameras weren't around....

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/01/24/chelsea-clinton-steps-up-role/