Former President Bill Clinton speaks during an organizing event Thursday, Jan. 21, 2016, for his wife, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, at Advanced Technologies Academy.
Thursday, Jan. 21, 2016 | 11 p.m.
Former President Bill Clinton criticized the Republican Party on Thursday night in Las Vegas while stumping for his wife and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in a speech that touched on police brutality, health care and social equality.
Speaking to a crowd of about 300 at the Advanced Technologies Academy magnet high school, Clinton spent much of his speech commending his wife’s tenure as a U.S. senator and, most recently, as secretary of state. He criticized Republicans for “always putting the blame on someone else.”
“They distract people, divide people and demonize people, and they do a great job of it,” Clinton told the packed gymnasium.
Without mentioning Republican front-runner Donald Trump by name, Clinton called out GOP presidential candidates for focusing their campaigns on “negative” issues to generate publicity. He mentioned the success of Mexico in producing top-notch engineers as an example of Republicans ignoring important facts.
“Instead of applauding their success, it turns into ‘they’re taking your jobs, and we have to build a wall,’” Clinton said.
The former president also addressed viral videos of police shootings as a way to promote his wife’s “inclusive social policies.”
“I'm tired of looking at African-American men that are shot when they're unarmed,” Clinton said.
Clinton said he was in favor of President Barack Obama’s stance on health care, and affirmed his wife supported Obamacare.
“Hillary thinks it would be a mistake to replace and repeal the Affordable Care Act.”
He said he believed a Hillary Clinton presidency would also help improve rising death rates of middle-age white Americans, a “national travesty” that was reported in November. Clinton said the rise in mortality rates could be attributed to a “broken heart, because the American dream is lost to them.”
The 42nd president said his wife would propose $10 million in grants for each state to give “every state and every community the mental health treatment it needs.”
Finally, Clinton touched on the cost of college education to differentiate his wife’s policies with those of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders.
He said college tuition should be paid for “middle class and working-class people” but that it “should not be free for everyone.”
The former president left the audience with two questions before exiting the stage just before 9 p.m.
“Do children have a better future? Are we coming together rather than being torn apart? If you want to be able to say yes at the end of the next term, you'll elect Hillary president.”
Clinton is scheduled to speak Friday night in Reno at the Boys and Girls Club of Truckee Meadows.
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