Clinton to Sanders: I d-ropped out for Obama – it was 'the right thing to do'

In her most explicit indication to date that she is on the cusp of claiming the mantle as her party’s presidential nominee, and expects the Vermont senator to clear the way, Clinton drew a direct comparison with her decision to concede victory against Barack Obama in 2008.

“Tomorrow is eight years to the day after I withdrew and endorsed then-senator Obama,” she said. “I believed it was the right thing to do. No matter what differences we had in our long campaign, they paled in comparison to the differences we had with the Republicans.”

She added the imperative to take the fight to the Republicans was “even more true today” because of the specter of the Republican presumptive nominee Donald Trump in the White House.

Clinton said she hoped Sanders would help “unify” the party after tomorrow’s primaries. “Because we’ve got to be unified going into the convention and going out of the convention to take on Donald Trump and to repudiate that kind of campaign he is running and to make it clear that’s not the kind of president or commander in chief we want.”

Clinton made the comments in a rare exchange reporters at a campaign event in Compton, near Los Angeles, that was timed to coincide with a press conference Sanders was holding in Emeryville, near San Francisco.


 Hillary Clinton at the community center in Compton whe-re she made her remarks. Photograph: John Locher/AP

The senator, his voice hoarse, reacted with irritation to a reporter who asked him to respond to female voters who believe it would be sexist for him to remain in the race despite being far behind Clinton in his delegate count.

“Is that a serious question?” he replied. “Your question implies that any woman who is running for president is by definition the best candidate. … I don’t think it is sexist … I believe I’m the stronger candidate.”

With votes still to be cast on Tuesday in California, New Jersey, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and New Mexico, and around 700 delegates in total at stake, Sanders insisted it was premature to “speculate” on his withdrawal.

He indicated he would campaign ahead of the final primary in the District of Columbia on 14 June but also made remarks that left open the possibility he might review his position after Tuesday’s results.

“You’re asking me to speculate. Let me just talk to you after the primary here in California whe-re we hope to win,” he said. “Let’s assess whe-re we are after tomorrow.”

However the scale of the mathematical challenge facing the Vermont senator in his quest to prize the nomination away f-rom Clinton, even off the back of a major win in California, was made plain when he was quizzed by reporters over his chances of al-tering the all-important delegate count.

Clinton, after convincing wins in the US Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico over the weekend, is now fewer than 30 delegates short of the tally needed to win the Democratic nomination for president, according to an Associated Press count that includes superdelegate votes that are not bound by elections.

She also leads in “pledged delegates” – those whose vote is determined by primaries and caucuses, having won 1,812 compared to Sanders 1,521.

When her overwhelming majority of superdelegates are combined with her narrower majority of pledged delegates, Clinton will be able to claim she has the backing of at least 2,383 delegates – the tally required under Democratic party rules to seal the nomination.

She will almost certainly reach that threshold in New Jersey, the first state to vote on Tuesday and one whe-re she is expected to easily win – possibly before polls have even closed in California.

Sanders, however, hopes that a strong victory in California and other states will bolster his argument as a more formidable opponent against Trump, helping persuade sufficient numbers of superdelegates to switch sides.

For that to happen, Sanders would need to convince hundreds of Democratic party officials who have superdelgate votes to abandon their support for Clinton, the establishment candidate, for a maverick socialist who has spent almost his entire career outside of the party.

Pressed over the chances of that, Sanders said that his campaign had so far managed to convince “three or four” superdelegates to switch allegiance. “There’s no question that we are going to get more,” he added. “We are in private conversations. We have seen a little bit of momentum.”

He predicted that more superdelegates would flip when they look at “the objective evidence of polling” and “the objective evidence of who has the strongest grassroots campaign”.

“I am very proud that in virtually every national poll and in every statewide poll … we are defeating Trump and we are defeating him badly,” he said, adding of Clinton: “In some cases, she is actually losing to Trump when we are defeating him.”

Sanders added: “My focus is on winning the largest state in our country.”

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