Clinton Enlists Sanders In Appeal For Youth Votes (Video)

Now that Hillary Clinton has dispatched Bernie Sanders, she’s making a big play for one of his core fan bases: young voters.

The first high-profile Sanders staffer, specializing in college student outreach, decamped earlier this month from Burlington to Brooklyn, joining other battleground state aides who had worked for the Vermont senator and are now in Clinton’s camp. Advisers to both candidates say more Sanders staffers will be hired soon.

Meanwhile, Clinton’s allies in the environmental, labor and women’s health communities are tapping into the same data, digital and other messaging tactics that Sanders used to such great effect in galvanizing millions of millennial supporters.

U.S. Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton shared a stage with former rival Senator Bernie Sanders on Wednesday to appeal for youth votes in the Nov. 8 election as opinion polls show a close race with Republican Donald Trump.

Clinton told an audience at the University of New Hampshire that she would make college affordable if she wins the White House, the kind of promise that won Sanders many young supporters during the Democratic nominating contest. “We should and we will make public colleges tuition-free for families earning less than $125,000 a year,” Clinton said. She vowed to help those who already have student debt to refinance.

Clinton’s campaign is worried that some polls show voters under the age of 30 might not turn out in great numbers at polling stations in November, potentially giving an advantage to Trump.

It is understandable if Hillary Clinton’s team is traumatized by having to fight once again for New Hampshire. The first-in-the-nation primary state delivered her a crucial comeback victory against Barack Obama in 2008 and then, eight years later, dealt her what was perhaps last spring’s most all-encompassing defeat. Bernie Sanders beat her by more than 22 points, winning just about everywhere in the state, and carrying nearly every demographic group outside the oldest and the richest.

While the last time New Hampshire went red was in 2000, it still represents one of the Clinton campaign’s most perplexing challenges. The reason is that, while Sanders may now stand behind the Democratic presidential nominee, not all his supporters have followed, which may explain why Clinton has invited Sanders to appear by her side Wednesday when she discusses college affordability on the campus of the University of New Hampshire.

New Hampshire is emblematic of a larger Clinton problem. The youth vote was one of the pillars of the Obama coalition. But thus far it’s proven perhaps the most difficult one for Clinton to rebuild. Polls show the nominee failing to earn the confidence of young voters—only 33 percent of those between ages 18-29 told Gallup this month that they approved of her—and running far behind where she would hope to be against her Republican opponent. The polls also show Clinton currently winning under half their votes, while Obama got over three-fifths of that demographic in both of his campaigns