Back in DC, Clinton, Trump work to unify respective parties

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

The presidential race shifted to the nation’s capital Friday, with Democrats executing a carefully orchestrated plan to unify their party around presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton.

Her likely general-election rival, Donald Trump, continued his months-long effort to win over the Republican base, with events wooing top donors and evangelical voters.

With the primary contests all but over, a series of top Democrats formally announced their support for Clinton, headlined by the glowing endorsement of President Barack Obama on Thursday.

Within hours, Vice President Joe Biden and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren joined that effort, both backing Clinton and signaling to many of Sanders’ supporters that it’s time to unite around the party’s presumptive nominee. Clinton and Warren met privately for about an hour Friday morning at Clinton’s home in Washington, intensifying speculation that the progressive stalwart may be tapped for the vice presidency.

“If you really want to electrify the base, you’ve got to get somebody who’s been speaking to the base and is going to turn the base out,” said Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., one of Sanders’ top supporters in Congress. He said he and other progressives would be thrilled if Clinton tapped Warren for her ticket.

Democrats in Washington are eager to unite their party against Trump and avoid a lingering intraparty spat. Primary rival Bernie Sanders, who’s vowed to take his political revolution to their national Democratic convention in July, has been stressing his determination to defeat Trump, perhaps signaling that he may exit the race or at least shift his focus away from Clinton after the final primary election Tuesday in Washington, D.C.

On Friday, he retreated to his home in Burlington, Vt., to plot his next steps.

Clinton, meanwhile, delivered her first speech since becoming the presumptive nominee, addressing advocates at Planned Parenthood, the women’s health organization and abortion provider. The nonprofit was a strong champion of Clinton in the primaries, giving her its first endorsement in their 100-year history.

Describing Trump as someone who “doesn’t hold women in high regard,” Clinton launched into an unabashedly feminist attack on her GOP rival, arguing he would take the country back to “when abortion was illegal, women had far fewer options and life for too many women and girls was limited.”

Trump, who also has faced resistance from corners of his party, addressed a gathering of conservative evangelical voters at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority conference not long after Clinton spoke.

Facing criticism for suggesting a judge’s Mexican heritage biased him in a case against the now-defunct Trump University, Trump struck a more-welcoming tone.

“No one should be judged by their race or their color and the color of their skin,” he said. “We’re going to bring our nation together.”