Hillary Clinton on Monday made almost no mention of her Democratic primary rival Bernie Sanders, instead keeping her focus squarely on the general election.
Campaigning in Massachusetts ahead of this week’s Super Tuesday contests, Clinton trained her fire on “whomever the Republicans decide to nominate.”
{mosads}She accused the GOP’s candidates of “peddling the same snake oil” on deregulation, cowing to the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch on climate change, and only campaigning to represent the “wealthy.”
“When I think about this upcoming general election, we are going to have a great debate about the economy and we need to because we need to once and for all end their reliance on the idea that cutting taxes for the wealthy will trickle down,” Clinton said in Springfield.
“It doesn’t seem like the Republican candidates respect anybody’s rights except the wealthy, the well-connected, the powerful. They are happy to give them whatever they want.”
Clinton didn’t check any of her potential rivals by name, though she repeated her usual barb against Donald Trump by evoking his slogan.
“I don’t think America has stopped being great, we need to make America whole again,” she said.
“Rejecting the mean spiritedness, the hateful rhetoric, the insults — that’s not who we are.”
The Democratic frontrunner typically includes a long riff against Republicans in her stump speech, but the overwhelming focus on the party reflects a tonal shift for Clinton. Earlier this month, she dedicated large portions of her events toward full-throated contrasts with Sanders.
But now, fresh off an overwhelming victory Saturday in South Carolina and leading in several Super Tuesday states, Clinton appears to be changing tack.
She only referred to Sanders twice, both toward the back-end of the speech without mentioning his name. She warned the crowd that the country couldn’t afford another “contentious” debate on healthcare, a dig at Sanders’ call for replacing ObamaCare with single-payer health care. And she called her views on gun control “one of the principle differences between me and my opponent.”
But in the same breath, she made it clear that the contrast was as much about Sanders as it was about her GOP rivals by telling the crowd her views on gun control are about “more” than just her disagreements with Sanders.
“If I am so fortunate enough to be the nominee, I will turn my attention to whomever the Republicans decide to nominate,” she said.
“They’ve been after me for 25 years and I’m still standing.”