Biden in 3/30/17 speech says Hillary lost because she failed to speak about how to maintain a large middle class. NY Times Nate Cohn largely agreed with Biden, said "Democrats have either assumed they didn't need white working-class voters or took their support for granted"-AOL News, 3/31/17

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3/31/17, "Biden talks about what led to Hillary Clinton's defeat in 2016," AOLNews.com

"Former Vice President Joe Biden has suggested that Hillary Clinton failed to win the presidential election because she didn't address the concerns of middle-class Americans, reports CNN.

During a speech he gave at the University of Pennsylvania on Thursday, he said, about her loss, "What happened was that this is the first campaign that I can recall where my party did not talk about what it always stood for—and that is how to maintain a burgeoning middle class."

He added, "The truth of the matter is, you didn't hear a single solitary sentence in the last campaign about that guy working on the assembly line making $60,000 a year and a wife making $32,000 as a hostess in a restaurant. And they...making $90,000 and they got two kids and they can't make it. And they're scared, they're frightened."

The New York Times' Nate Cohn largely agreed with Biden; a week after the election was decided, he pointed out, "I think the bigger issue is that Democrats have either assumed they didn't need white working-class voters or took their support for granted."

He then said, "What part of Hillary Clinton's message was aimed at less educated white voters? It just wasn't at the core of her appeal this year. It was nothing like 2012, when President Obama relentlessly focused on the middle class, Bain Capital, the auto bailout, etc."

Meanwhile, in a recent report, CNN argues that "Clinton did attempt to speak to working class voters on the campaign trail...But the overarching message of her campaign, especially at the end, was more often anti-Donald Trump than policy messaging toward these voters."

The recent speech wasn't Biden's first time speaking out about Clinton's campaign; last December, he told the Los Angeles Times that he didn't think she ever figured out why she was running for president other than, perhaps, out of a sense of duty to women."



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