Bill Clinton paints wife Hillary as 'changemaker' in Greenville

A diverse crowd of hundreds packed the West End Community Development Center to see the President Bill Clinton stump for his wife, presidential candidate and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in his first visit to Greenville in 2016.

"Look at this crowd, it’s a lot more diverse than if we had had it 30 years ago," Bill Clinton said to the crowd that included black and Hispanic people, students, and mothers with babies. "It would have been a lot more guys like Dick (Riley, former S.C. governor) and me, old white guys."

Bill Clinton, an extremely popular figure in Democratic politics, focused on what his wife could do for those communities as president.

He highlighted Hillary Clinton's plan to make public and historically black colleges and universities debt-free for middle- and working-class students, drawing contrast to her primary opponent Sen. Bernie Sanders' plan, which doesn't include private HBCUs, without mentioning him by name. He touted her plan for expanding healthcare without transitioning to a Sanders-preferred single-payer system, noting that France and Germany are considered by some experts to have the best healthcare policies in the world, and do not utilize single-payer systems.

But the former president did not take any sharp jabs at Sanders; his sharp tongue got him and Hillary Clinton in trouble in South Carolina in 2008, when comments about then-Sen. Barack Obama's candidacy caused a backlash and Hillary Clinton later lost the primary.

Now, Hillary Clinton is the frontrunner in South Carolina polls by an average of nearly 23 points, although she is facing a tighter race nationally. While she has been painted as part of the Democratic "establishment," Bill Clinton on Tuesday said she was and always had been a "changemaker."

"From the first time I met her, to yesterday, she’s the best changemaker I’ve ever known," Bill Clinton said. "She was always making something good, and I never met anybody who was better."

The effort to cast Hillary Clinton as a "changemaker" in the mind of the electorate comes as Sanders is seen by many in the Democratic party, especially young voters, as an outsider who can start a "political revolution" with policies like tuition-free public universities and universal healthcare under a single-payer system. Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton and campaign supporters are trying to counter Sanders' insurgency of support by casting the former secretary of state's plans as more plausible and pragmatic.

"There’s a lot of agreement between these candidates on things," Bill Clinton said. "They disagree on what the best way to handle the college loan program is. Hillary thinks her plan is better. They disagree on what the best way to handle healthcare is. Hillary thinks it was a monumental achievement to pass the Affordable Care Act and we just have to go from 90 to 100 instead of going from zero to 100."

Brandy Fischer, a longtime Hillary Clinton supporter and owner of counseling center Mind Renewal Services, said Hillary Clinton's plans for college affordability and healthcare make more sense to her and her husband, a physician.

"My husband is a physician and we don't see single-payer as a realistic option," Fischer said. "A lot of [Sanders'] plans aren't realistic. We have four kids, and it's their futures I worry about.

Fischer and her husband both attended private HBCUs, which are covered under Hillary Clinton's college affordability plan but not Sanders'.

"They are a vital part of our community, and it doesn't seem like Sen. Sanders' plan would allow them to continue operating as they do now," Fischer said, worried that Sanders' plan would drive up tuition at private HBCUs. Sanders' college affordability plan makes public colleges and universities tuition free, which would apply to historically black schools in South Carolina like South Carolina State University, which is public, but not Claflin University, which is private.

But other voters dismiss the worries that Sanders' plans are unrealistic. Salma Genis, a Carolina High School senior, said she was undecided on who she would vote for in the Feb. 27 Democratic primary, but that she was leaning towards Sanders.

"His ideas seem very hopeful," Genis said. "A lot of people say it's not realistic, but in America right now, we need hope."