Van Jones: Hillary Became ‘Hillary Rodham Obama’ Because She Had To Counter Sanders’ Rise

CNN Political Commentator and former green jobs advisor to President Obama Van Jones argued that Democratic presidential candidate former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton debuted “a brand new candidate no one’s ever seen before, Hillary Rodham Obama” because she had “to do something” to counter the rise of fellow candidate Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) on Monday’s “CNN Newsroom.”

Jones said that during Sunday’s Democratic debate, “we saw the debut of a brand new candidate no one’s ever seen before, Hillary Rodham Obama. I have never seen Hillary Clinton hugging onto Barack Obama, every turn. Because, what you saw was, you saw Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who’s much closer to the party base on questions like healthcare. The base wants universal healthcare. The base is mad at Wall Street. So every time he tries to hit her, she goes and grabs President Obama and says, ‘I love President Obama’s Wall Street plan. I love his healthcare plan.’ And he was flummoxed. For the first time, you saw Bernie Sanders not really able to deal with it, and that pro-Obama, African-American, South Carolina audience was eating it up. Hillary Clinton outfoxed him. It was an amazing thing.”

Jones added, “this Sanders surge is a real thing. There is a big, big hunger in this party for bold ideas and bold thinking. I think Sanders has done a brilliant job of tapping into that, which means that, with her being on the defensive, and seeing those trend lines, she had to do something, and what I thought, when she pull out of her hat becoming Hillary Rodham Obama, that night, was a brilliant move for her. But Sanders is on the rise, and I think, deservedly so.

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