WILLIAMSON, W.Va. — Hillary Clinton faced some angry voters Monday during a campaign swing through West Virginia, a state that overwhelmingly backed her eight years ago in her primary fight against then-Sen. Barack Obama.
Bo Copley, an unemployed coal worker, asked Clinton why voters should believe her pledge to help revitalize the region’s economy during a stop at a health center in Williamson.
“Still supporting her hurts you,” he told Sen. Joe Manchin, who joined Clinton at the small round-table event. “It’s not a good outlook here.”
Clinton released a $30 billion plan last fall aimed at aiding communities dependent on coal production and she’s promised that her husband would focus on revitalizing the region.
Her efforts haven’t been helped by a remark she made in a March interview with CNN, when she said she would “put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business.” She was responding to a question about how her policies would benefit poor white people in southern states.
Copley asked, “How you could say you are going to put a lot of coal miners out of jobs and then come in here and tell us how you’re going to be our friend?”
Clinton called the comment a “misstatement.”
“I can’t take it back, and I certainly can’t get people who, for political reasons or personal reasons, very painful reasons, are upset with me,” she said. “I want you to know I’m going to do whatever I can to help no matter what happens politically.”
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