Hillary Clinton signals to Jewish donors: I’ll be a better Friend to Israel than Obama
Hillary Clinton is privately signaling to wealthy Jewish donors that — no matter the result of the Iranian nuclear negotiations — she will be a better friend to Israel than President Barack Obama.
But, even as donors increasingly push Clinton on the subject in private, they have emerged with sometimes widely varying interpretations about whether she would support a prospective deal, according to interviews with more than 10 influential donors and fundraising operatives.
Clinton’s private responses in some ways resemble a foreign policy Rorschach test; donors who see a deal as important to world peace have come away thinking that Clinton shares their perspective, but so, too, do donors who oppose any prospective agreement as compromising Israeli security.
Publicly, she’s expressed support for the negotiating process, which she secretly initiated during her time as secretary of state, but has also said “no deal is better than a bad deal.”
With the talks heading into the home stretch in Vienna, the issue is emerging as an early test for Clinton’s presidential campaign. She’s already struggling to balance two of her biggest strengths as a candidate — her deep foreign policy track record and her vaunted fundraising ability — and that balance could become even trickier if there’s a deal.
“Whatever way you go, there will be some people who won’t like it,” said Sarah Kovner, a prominent New York donor who is a leading bundler for Clinton’s campaign and worked in Bill Clinton’s presidential administration. “You can’t have everybody with you. You’ve got to do what you think is right for the country.”
The negotiations are of intense interest for some Jewish donors whose political giving is animated by their support for Israel. They’re being counted on by Clinton’s allies to donate huge sums for a campaign and a pair of supportive super PACs that, taken together, are expected to raise $2 billion or more.
Source: www.politico.com