Hillary Clinton proudly cracked through the glass ceiling to become the first woman to accept the presidential nomination for either the Democrats or the Republicans.
But now she faces the challenge of winning over voters — not just the Democrats unsure she’s the right candidate, but Republican voters who aren’t inclined to vote for Donald Trump.
READ MORE: True or false? Fact checking Hillary Clinton’s DNC speech
There is a growing list of GOP faithful who are switching sides in favour of Clinton, ranging from former Republican legislators to members of past administrations.
The Republicans for Hillary campaign took centre stage on the final night of the Democratic National Convention Thursday evening.
“Trump is a petulant, dangerously unbalanced reality star who will coddle tyrants and alienate our allies. I shudder to think where he might lead our great nation,” Doug Elmets, a former Ronald Reagan-era White House official, told the Democratic delegates on the convention floor.
“I knew Ronald Reagan. I worked for Ronald Reagan. Donald Trump you are no Ronald Reagan.”
Elmets admitted he didn’t agree with all of the points in Clinton’s platform, but he hailed her political chops and a Democratic platform that was that was far more unifying than the Republican platform he called “the most alarming I’ve ever seen.”
“To my fellow Republicans,” Elmets said, “if you want a president with good judgment, a steady hand and a temperament to represent our nation to the world — and our children — I ask that you join me in voting for Hillary Clinton.”
Jennifer Pierrotti Lin, co-founder of the group Republican Women for Hillary, declared she was a lifelong Republican who is switching sides this election instead of voting for a candidate and a party that has “abandoned” the GOP values she holds dear.
She was particularly put off by comments Trump has made about women throughout the past 13 months of his presidential campaign.
READ MORE: Democratic campaign committee computers hacked in cyber breach
“In Donald Trump’s America, it doesn’t matter that I’m an accomplished attorney and a policy expert, it just matters how attractive I am on a scale of one to 10.”
- Princess Anne to help commission new navy vessel in B.C. ceremony
- Some 2019 candidates ‘appeared willing’ to engage with foreign interference: Hogue inquiry
- Foreign interference ‘undermined’ public confidence in elections: inquiry
- Canada, Manitoba to develop Red Dress Alert for missing Indigenous women and girls
She also dismissed any claim that she was only voting for Clinton this election because she’s a woman.
“People who say that dismiss my voice and Hillary’s long record of public service.”
But beyond Elmets and Pierrotti Lin, the Daily Beast has compiled a list of 30 “GOP bigwigs” who have indicated they will abandon the Republicans when they cast their votes on Nov. 8.
Among them are Mark Lenzi, a former spokesperson for the Republican Party in New Hampshire — a state Donald Trump won in the primaries; Henry Paulson Jr., a treasury secretary in George W. Bush’s administration; Dan Akerson, a former CEO at General Motors; Arne Carlson, the former Republican governor of Minnesota; and Richard Armitage, George W. Bush’s Deputy Secretary of State.
But perhaps one of the most resounding endorsements, came from that of another billionaire-turned-politician — former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Bloomberg and Clinton have a history of working to rebuild New York City in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. She was in her first months representing New York in the Senate, while he was elected mayor two months after the attack. But, he’s also no fan of Trump.
READ MORE: Donald Trump targets ‘Little’ Michael Bloomberg and ‘Crooked’ Hillary Clinton on Twitter after DNC
Once a Republican but now an independent, he too appeared at this week’s Democratic convention to sell Clinton as the candidate of choice.
“I know Hillary Clinton is not flawless. No candidate is,” he said at the convention Wednesday night. “But she is the right choice and the responsible choice in this election.”
And Hillary also got the backing of the Houston Chronicle the day after accepting the Democratic nomination. The publication has endorsed Republicans in all but two other races — Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964 and Barack Obama in 2008.
“It’s telling that so many Republicans have distanced themselves from their party’s nominee,” the publication’s editorial board wrote Friday, before comparing her platform and temperament to that of Trump.
But Clinton still has to fight for votes from Democrats that are unhappy about her rise over former presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders. Some Sanders supporters say they would rather vote for Trump than her.
“I’ve talked to enough Sanders delegates here to realize that there is no way some of them will ever vote for Hillary Clinton,” Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics, told Global News this week. “I’ve actually had Bernie delegates say to me one term of Trump would be survivable — better than two terms of Hillary.”
Comments