Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy speech Thursday doubled as her sharpest attack yet this election season on Donald Trump. She went after the man she repeatedly, dismissively called “Donald” with an arsenal of witty one liners and denunciations.
As Clinton spoke on a stage in San Diego flanked by rows of American flags, her words seemed to transcend the realm of foreign policy, foreshadowing the blunt, incisive and decidedly patriotic approach she’d take in the general election. And with her combination of gravitas and sharp rhetoric, it looks increasingly like she may be the one person able to pull off what no one in the Republican primary ever could: mount the definitive assault on Trump’s tough-guy image.
Speaking just days before the primary vote in California, Clinton already seemed intent on campaigning in the general, saying she would “leave it to the psychiatrists to explain [Trump’s] affection for tyrants”, and that the trouble for Trump when it comes to foreign policy and everything else is that “this isn’t reality television – this is actual reality”.
Gone was any nod to Democratic rival Bernie Sanders, who is only barely behind her in California polls of Democrats, and leads her handily with independents and younger voters. This despite the impressively potent challenge the Vermont senator has mounted against her throughout the primary season.
The speech was also something of a departure in tone for the usually serious and somber Clinton. Her approach was at times flippant and even sarcastic, with the audience whooping and hollering. At one point, there was even a call-and-response.
Clinton has previously sought to cast herself as the “steady hand” steering US foreign policy, and this speech she continued in that vein, drawing out questions of temperament and character and consistency – you may not like me, she seemed to say, but you can’t trust Trump to take care of our country.
After all it’s hard to know exactly what his approach to foreign policy would be. (He’s made noises about opposing American interventionism only to speak out in favor of over-the-top violence later.)
And then there’s the issue of his bigotry and xenophobia as they pertain to national security.
Recalling the time he referred to Mexican immigrants as rapists and called for a national ban of all Muslims, Clinton reminded her audience how poorly such comments would play with allies like Pope Francis or the president of Mexico. “He praises dictators like Vladimir Putin and picks fights with our friends,” she observed, adding, “He says he has foreign policy experience because he ran the Miss Universe pageant in Russia.”
Clinton also talked up her own record, noting that she visited 112 countries as secretary of state and stood up for the rights of women and LGBT people around the world.
Sanders in the primary has gone after Clinton for her relatively hawkish foreign policy record. And Clinton showed no signs of shying away from any of that in Thursday’s speech. But ultimately she spent very little time with her own record for the simple reason that she doesn’t really need to. All she needs to do is talk about Trump’s judgement, and the picture she wants to leave voters with paints itself.
No sooner had Clinton begun attacking his foreign policy prowess Thursday, for instance, then Trump was out on Twitter calling her “crooked” and saying she “doesn’t look presidential”. Clinton didn’t need to read the tweets to know he would do that; she was ahead of him, asking the gathered crowd to engage in a little thought experiment with her.
Imagine Donald Trump sitting in the situation room, only instead of just his Twitter account, he controlled the nuclear codes, she said. “Do we want his finger anywhere near the button?”
The answer from the crowd was a resounding, “No!”
Nobody got past that terrifying image of Trump’s hands on the nuclear codes to ask what she would do in the same position.
