The Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee called for using far-right candidates “as a cudgel to move the more established candidates further to the right.” Clinton’s camp insisted that Trump and other extremists should be “elevated” to “leaders of the pack” and media outlets should be told to “take them seriously.”
She may not be playing now, but I feel it’s fair to point out that Hillary has played some stupid games - the American people reap the stupid prize.
The Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee called for using far-right candidates “as a cudgel to move the more established candidates further to the right.”
It’s important to note that this also applied to Democratic candidates. With the Republicans moving 100 miles to the Right, Democrats didn’t think anyone would notice them moving 20 miles to the Right. Clinton and the DNC are just as responsible for the Overton window shift as the Republicans are. If not more so. Had they embraced and supported people like Sanders, who would have absolutely demolished Trump, we wouldn’t be in this fucking mess.
The original source is a verified, leaked email (dated April 23, 2015) from her 2016 campaign. The DNC plan was attached in the email and can be found here.
The specific quote is from Salon.
I don’t know about what they said, but it’s pretty well known that the DNC encouraged Trump because he was viewed as unelectable. Clinton sucks
That’s part of it, but the other part is so much worse. The DNC and the Clinton campaign strategy was to elevate “unelectable” far-right nutjobs like Trump so that the Democratic party could intentionally pivot to the Right and still look like real opposition by contrast. They saw the writing on the wall ever since Sanders (and left-leaning policies in general) started gaining mainstream popularity in the late 2000s. The Dems are beholden to the same corporate billionaires as the Republicans, and the mere whiff of Leftism-lite made them all terrified that they might become slightly less wealthy under a SocDem government, and that “we the people” might become slightly more influential in said government.