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Chelsea Clinton Returns to Asheville in Campaign's Closing Days

With election day almost upon us, both campaigns are making a final push to rally support in North Carolina.  Hillary Clinton’s daughter Chelsea made a return visit to Asheville on Saturday.  If you’re going to come to Asheville, it’s appropriate to stop at a brewery.  Chelsea Clinton was in Asheville in late September for a visit to the climate change center The Collider.  This time, she visited Twin Leaf Brewery at South Slope downtown.  Just like the last event, she spoke for a short time to rally support for her mom, before taking questions.  The first question was about student loans and Clinton said her mother wanted to do three things.

“One, we have to move to make community college tuition free for everyone.  Two, we have to move to make state colleges and universities tuition free for anyone coming from a family making $125,000 dollars or less a year.  That’s more than 85 percent of families here in North Carolina.  But third, she thinks that everyone should be in an income contingency repayment plan.”

Clinton also took questions about climate change, small business and addressed some of the controversy surrounding her mother in recent weeks.

“I don’t remember a time when my parents and particularly my mother weren’t under attack.  So this is not new.  I mean, what’s new about this election to me is not the cynical forces that want to protect the status quo going after my mom.  It’s the cynical forces that want to protect the status quo going after huge swathes of the country.  I mean that’s what I find so disturbing.  “Make America great” is thinly-coded language for “make America white, straight, male and wealthy.”  I mean that does not include most of us.”

25-year-old Jill Padfield was one of the several hundred supporters there to see Clinton speak.  She says she’s already voted.

“Almost all my friends have voted.  Overall, we really did a lot of early voting.  Luckily North Carolina had a good amount.  SO we were able to go out and vote and it seems like I don’t really have any friends that aren’t voting for Hillary.”

Meredith and Steven Kidd voted already too.  They admitted the election had them nervous.

Meredith: “I am a little.  I am a little.  I’ll be honest but I’m hoping it’s gonna swing our way on Tuesday.”

Steven: “You just thought that the Brexit vote was a surprise.  What happened in Colombia seemed to be a surprise.   That was a heavy favorite in the polls to make peace with the FARC.  And so you never know until the elections are over.”

Buncombe County voters came out in droves for early voting.  But with that behind us, the campaigns want to make sure anyone left that hasn’t voted makes it to the polls on Tuesday.  

Bonus:

JillPadfield.mp3
Hillary supporter Jill Padfield
thekidds.mp3
Hillary supporters Meredith and Steven Kidd

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