Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton said that she was “saddened” by the loud chants of “lock her up” at last week’s Republican National Convention, which dedicated a large portion of the proceedings to calling her character into question and attempting to portray her as a criminal.
“It felt very sad,” she said in her first interview with newly anointed running mate Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), which aired Sunday on “60 minutes.”
“I don’t know what their convention was about, other than criticizing me. I seem to be the only unifying theme that they had. There was no positive agenda. It was a very dark, divisive campaign. And the people who were speaking were painting a picture of our country that I did not recognize ― you know, negative, scapegoating, fear, bigotry, smears. I just was so, I was saddened by it.”
Trump’s speech, in particular, was predicated on a vision of America as a fearful and dangerous place.
Indeed, last week’s Republican National Convention at times seemed to focus more on vilifying Clinton than celebrating its nominee, Donald Trump. Speakers spent a lot of time re-litigating Clinton’s resume and trying to paint her as a criminal, arguing that she was directly responsible for the attack in Benghazi, Libya.
In Sunday’s interview, Kaine called the “lock her up” chants and “Crooked Hillary,” Trump’s favorite insult against Clinton, “ridiculous,” noting that congressional Republicans have dedicated numerous investigations to the scandal, but none of them found Clinton responsible for criminal wrongdoing.
Clinton asserted that the Democrats’ convention this week would offer a striking contrast to Trump’s divisiveness, negativity and lack of substance.
“We have a very positive agenda. You’ll hear a lot about it in Philadelphia this week,” she said. “You know, people make fun of me sometimes because I do have plans. But I think I have this old fashioned idea that when you are asking people to vote for you, it is kind of like a big job interview, and you ought to tell people what you think you can do for them.”
Clinton’s choice of Kaine as running mate was also seen as a way to emphasize experience, since the Virginia senator has had a long career in politics, previously serving as his state’s governor, and prior to that, as mayor of Richmond, Virginia.
Following the convention, Clinton and Kaine will embark on a bus tour through the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Ohio. Making stops in Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, Youngstown and Columbus, their focus will be on Clinton’s economic platform and proving that she will be a better advocate for working-class voters than Trump.
Clinton reiterated her condemnation of the name-calling and personal attacks that Trump frequently employs.
“I’m not going to engage in that kind of insult-fest that he seems to thrive on,” she said. “So whatever he says about me, he’s perfectly free to use up his own airtime and his own space to do.”
Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.