On a conference call today, Team Clinton was brimming with enthusiasm about the states that vote this week. As for the states voting today, they just wanted to emphasize the predictions of victory from the Obama campaign, and emphasize that their rival expected to win by a wide margin.
Apparently a bit of expectation-setting, along with preparing a “we covered the point spread” spin for tonight…
Howard Wolfson notes they’ve raised $15 million in the first fifteen days of February. He suggests it is a response to the news that Hillary Clinton was loaning her campaign $5 million.
More comments after the jump…
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Howard Wolfson, Communications Director:
“If you look at the Obama campaign’s delegate projection, they predicted very big victories. They are on the record as predicting sizable victories…
We hoped to engage him in a debate, but he does not like to debate in states where he is ahead… We worked hard in Wisconsin, we worked hard for every vote. These are states in which the Obama campaign predicted sizeable victories… We are very excited about the next round of states.”
Robby Mook, Ohio State Director:
“We’re getting an excellent reception. We have a full operation up and running, we are in all 18 congressional districts. Big crowd for Bill Clinton this weekend. We’re working for every single delegate, looking to win every community and statewide.”
“Here we’re going to be focusing on home mortgage crisis, the economy, the cost of living, and the difficulty of affording health care. She’s not just here to make speeches. She’s here to engage with working folks and to talk about her real, substantive plans on these issues.”
“We have farmers from New York State going to farms talking about what Senator Clinton has done to promote agriculture.”
“We’re rolling out a new ad focusing on challenges Ohio families are facing.”
“We have an aggressive absentee and early voting program here; we’re seeing record numbers using those options.”
Ace Smith, Texas State Director:
“It’s absolutely amazing – anyone who’s been to 12,000 in El Paso… In San Antonio, we had an overflow that had almost as many people as the people inside. We have incredible enthusiasm here in Texas which we think will translate into votes.”
“We’re going to have a ground operation that this state hasn’t seen in a long time.”
“In California, we beat Obama among young voters. We intend to do the same thing in Texas.”
“Starting today, you have early voting. It really means showing up. You can go anywhere in your county and cast your vote. There is a little bit of a mail-in vote, but it’s fairly small.”
Wolfson: “Barack Obama is not running on his record. He is running on his powerful oratory and his promises.”