Silent Chelsea Clinton Brushes Off 9-Year-Old Reporter on Campaign Trail
Dec. 30: Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., right and daughter Chelsea greet an audience in Vinton, Iowa. (AP Photo)
VINTON, Iowa — It’s one thing for Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign to turn down interview requests for the candidate’s daughter, Chelsea. But can’t a 9-year-old reporter catch a break?
Sydney Rieckhoff, a Cedar Rapids fourth grader and “kid reporter” for Scholastic News, has posed questions to seven Republican and Democratic presidential hopefuls as they’ve campaigned across Iowa this year. But when she approached the 27-year-old Chelsea after a campaign event Sunday, she got a different response.
“Do you think your dad would be a good ‘first man’ in the White House?” Sydney asked, but Chelsea brushed her question aside.
“I’m sorry, I don’t talk to the press and that applies to you, unfortunately. Even though I think you’re cute,” Chelsea told the pint-sized journalist.
Such is the paradox of Chelsea as she campaigns across Iowa in the closing days before the state’s caucuses Jan. 3.
Tall and attractive, Chelsea cuts an impressive figure on the campaign trail; she plunges enthusiastically into the crowd after her mother’s speeches, shaking hands and posing for pictures while asking, “Are you going to caucus for my mom?”
But onstage, Chelsea never speaks; she stands next to her mother and applauds but utters not a single sentence and doesn’t even say hello. And reporters covering the campaign have been put on notice that Chelsea is not available to speak to them. An aide follows the former first daughter as she works the crowd, shushing reporters who approach her and try to ask any questions.
Famously protective of their daughter’s privacy, Bill and Hillary Clinton have taken pains to shield Chelsea from the harsh glare and rough edges of presidential politics. She stayed largely absent from her mother’s campaign until December, when she made her first visit to Iowa.
For her part, Sydney looked a bit crestfallen after Chelsea turned her away. But luckily for Hillary Clinton, Sydney’s mother has made up her mind to caucus for the former first lady.
“I like her position on family values and health care. And I think it’s time we have a female president,” Robyn Rieckhoff said.
Children learn from their parents, so you can see by an action like this, that the Clinton’s are not really thinking of our future generation but only of themselves and what they can get for themselves. I hope families really take notice of this.
OK… I’ll give her “tall”, but “attractive”??? PLEASE, only if she’s competing in the equestrian species.
Get a grip Felicia!!! This story was from AP, not Fox News.
Family values are reflected by the Clinton’s in the fact that their only child turned out to be poised, intelligant, graceful, and has kept a low profile. Their were certainly no stories about her “drunk driving” and chaulking it up to teenage years. Senator Clinton, and Former Chief in Commander should be very proud of their daugfhter.
She is just as plastic, unattractive and cold as her mother apparently. i can’t see shere having Hillary in the white house is any different from having bill a 3rd time. Per Whitney “Hell to the Naw”
So Billary shields thier daughter, but she goes around stumping for her MOM. sorry, she can’t have it both ways.. grow up Clintons..
Chelsea is a woman now, not a child and does not need her parents to “protect” her from the press, particularly a 9 year old. The ony assumption that can be drawn is that the Clinton’s believe that Chelsea cannot articulate her mother’s views to their advantage. Pitty, they should keep the press away from Bill, not Chelsea.
As a woman, I’m offended and appalled that another woman (this 9 year old’s mother) would vote for any candidate based on her gender. Saying it is time for a female president is not a good enough reason to vote for Hillary. If you agree with her policies, fine! But don’t fall back into the sexist (or racist) behavior that we have fought so hard to get past.
Hillary’s family values? Talk to Vince Foster’s wife and see how she is doing! Ask Jennifer Flowers how her sense of self-worth is holding up! The only values Hillary has are self-serving values! Ask some of the troopers in Arkansas if they can look themselves in the mirror! Ask some of the trial lawyers at her old firm how they feel about scandle-gate. See how well the careeres of FBI agents from the early 90’s who worked on the Vince Foster case has gone.
Hillary’s values are self-described, and shift with the political wind.
After reading some of the comments on this “issue”, I can understand why our founding fathers saw a representative type democracy better for the country than a direct democracy.