Democratic elder and former President Clinton, the ‘man from Hope,’ calls for a president of ‘joy’

CHICAGO —  He wasn’t the headliner, as he had been at so many previous Democratic conventions. He didn’t close out the program, as he did twice, as the nominee of the party.

But former President Clinton, speaking for the 12th time at a Democratic convention, still managed to fire up the party faithful with a folksy speech Wednesday night, in which he urged Americans to elect “Kamala Harris for the people and [not] the other guy, who has proved even more than the first go-round that he is about me, myself and I.”

“Kamala Harris will work to solve our problems, seize our opportunities, ease our fears and make sure every single American, however they vote, has a chance to chase their dreams,” Clinton said during his 27-minute speech.

Clinton, who turned 78 on Monday, gave his imprimatur to a candidate who was a young deputy district attorney in Alameda County when he won the White House in 1992.

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Clinton acknowledged what many Democrats have said this week in Chicago: the renewed sense the party can beat Trump with Harris as its nominee.

“We’ve got energy. We are happy,” Clinton said. “We feel like a load’s off our shoulders, and we know we’re just being asked to fight the same fight that the forces of progress have had to fight for 250 years.”

He began his remarks with a tribute to President Biden, comparing him to George Washington in his willingness to leave the presidency, when each had an opportunity to seek another term. “He did something that’s really hard for a politician to do,” Clinton said. “He voluntarily gave up political power.”

Former President Carter, 99 and ailing, was unable to attend the convention. That left Clinton as the Democrat’s elder statesman. And he seemed to relish the role, speaking in the slow, conversational style that he rode to power in the 1990s.

Clinton noted that in her youth Harris worked at McDonald’s, where she greeted customers with: “How can I help you?” “Now she’s at the pinnacle of power,” he said, “and she’s still asking, ‘How can I help you?’”

He contrasted that with Trump, who he suggested would “dodge what needs to be done by dividing, distracting and diverting us.”

“He’s still dividing, he’s still blaming, he’s still belittling other people,” Clinton said. “He creates chaos, and then he sort of curates it, as if it were precious art.”

Clinton seemed in no hurry to leave the stage. And he ended on a sentimental note, noting his journey from a town call Hope, Ark., and his long career, including attendance at every Democratic convention since 1972.

“I have no idea how many more of these I am going to be able to come to,” he said.

“Take it from a man who once had the honor to be called in this convention ‘a man from Hope,’“ he concluded. “We need Kamala Harris, the president of joy, to lead us.”