On Sunday, Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy for the 2016 U.S. presidential election with a very non-traditional video announcement. To many, the announcement comes as no surprise, as her candidacy has for months seemed like an inevitability, with pundits on both sides opining on when and how she would and should announce. Because of her comparative reclusivity up to this point, this first glimpse into the Clinton campaign offers valuable insights into the tone and strategy it will pursue in the coming months.
As a video, Clinton’s announcement can’t help but take on the tone of the wholesome and inspirational but disingenuous political ads we are used to seeing every four years. The announcement includes a variety of diverse individuals — a husband and wife on the cusp of retirement, two Spanish-speaking brothers who just opened a business, an expectant African-American couple, a recently graduated Asian-American woman, a soon-to-be-married gay couple, a white male entrepreneur and various others — clearly intended to show that Clinton represents everyone. While the message of diversity and unity is nice, it feels like a cheap attempt to pander to every electorate possible.
When she finally appears in the video after almost a minute and a half of diverse faces, she strikes an explicitly populist tone. “The deck is still stacked in favor of those at the top. Everyday Americans need a champion, and I want to be that champion,” she said in the video. While that’s a nice sentiment, it is a difficult message to accept without a healthy dose of skepticism, precisely because Clinton is one of those at the top that she is now rallying against. Her connection to well-heeled political donors and the movers and shakers of society runs deep as a result of her long career in politics.
As such, Clinton’s political opponents have been more than willing to attack what they see as Clinton’s removal from the realities of everyday Americans. In this light, the decision to impersonally announce her candidacy via video also seems particularly inexplicable.
When considering some of obstacles her campaign faces, however, this decision makes more sense. Americans have very little confidence in Congress, in the president and, more generally, in our political system. Any association with that political system or the political establishment, then, is dangerous territory. For this reason, we see “outsiders,” such as U.S. Sen. Rand Paul and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, rallying strong support behind their campaigns.
By embracing the use of modern technology via video, Clinton establishes herself as forward-looking and forward-moving, as distinct from the politics of the past and as a new kind of politician — the Democratic Paul or Cruz. She eschewed the traditional ways of the past in adopting this form of announcement. Whether or not this is the case remains to be seen, as the specific policy objectives of Clinton’s campaign have not yet come to light. Despite its unorthodoxy, the video format could also be seen as a smart move, as it allowed Clinton to look directly at and speak to millions of Americans, rather than talking to journalists at a press conference or donors at a fundraising dinner.
Nonetheless, Clinton’s long list of political experience — first lady for eight years, U.S. Senator for eight years, and U.S. Secretary of State — is her biggest political liability. This is a sad but true reflection on what it takes to get elected in this country, as her experience is also her most significant qualification. Still, her connection to the flailing Obama administration and the scandals during her tenure as Secretary of State — the mishandling of the Benghazi incident and the furor over deleted emails sent from her personal account — may haunt her as the campaign progresses.
Overall, it seems that Clinton is attempting to both reinvent herself and remind voters that she represents a new way of doing things, distinct from her previous political associations, even as Republican candidates are attempting to do the same.
This game of reinvention as a new breed of politician may be a harder sell for Clinton, given her spot in the political dynasty that she and her husband created, than it is for Tea Party Republicans. Thus, the race for the presidency is already shaping up to be a conflict between old and new, insider and outsider. If Jeb Bush makes a strong push for the Republican nomination, this conflict could become even more interesting, as he too has already begun the task of distancing himself from the administrations of his father and brother. In a direct faceoff, the presidency may fall to whoever does a better job of reinvention. Perhaps, as they say, everything old is new again.
