Former President Bill Clinton said it is not wrong to note that African-Americans are drawn to Barack Obama because of identity politics, but black voters should support Hillary Clinton anyway.

Clinton said he doesn’t think race is an issue when it comes to either Democratic presidential candidate’s commitment to civil rights, but it’s obvious that people are drawn to others who look similar to them.

“In every election, identity is a powerful pull. People tend to vote for people they identify with. … And I think for African-Americans who had been voting for decades for white candidates, they think they have got an African-American candidate with a legitimate chance to be nominated and elected. There is a pull here to identify with him,” Clinton told FOX News’ Greta Van Susteren in an exclusive interview that aired Monday night.

“It is not racially tinged to observe that fact or those facts,” Clinton added.

The former president, who has faced considerable scrutiny for comments he made along the trail suggesting that Obama could win only states with sizable African-American populations, said the election has to be reported as a conflict to attract notice.

In reality, however, “as American campaigns go, it has not been particularly conflict filled. And the truth is that most real voters in this process like both these candidates. … They are amazed that an election season would produce even one of these campaigns, much less two.”

But he noted that it is harder to be the spouse of the candidate than the candidate.

“When you’re in it you take all the stuff with a grain of salt and just blow it off. But when somebody you love is in it, you’re sitting there seeing every little thing. You know, it’s like a death by a thousand cuts. It’s much harder when you’re watching,” he said.

While toning down the racial remarks dotting the Democratic contest, the man who would be first husband accused Obama of surreptitiously running ads in Florida despite an agreement not to campaign there in response to the Democratic National Committee’s penalty of the state for holding its primary early. The DNC is refusing to seat both Michigan and Florida’s delegates at the national convention in August.

“No one advertised, as that was required, except Senator Obama,” he said. “I think it is very unusual for campaign to buy a national cable buy, they are the least efficient way to do it. … But the point is, he had it. There was big turnout. Hillary won the election by 17 points. And the delegates have been allocated appropriately. … Under the party rules, they could seat the superdelegates and then seat the others and only count them about half a delegate, which would cost her 19 delegates through no fault of her own or their own.”

The 42nd U.S. president also pinned the Democratic presidential nominating mess in Florida on the Republican-led Legislature, suggesting the DNC punished Florida voters for something the GOP did. Clinton said Florida Democrats begged to have their election on Feb. 5 — in compliance with party rules — but were denied by Republicans.

“Florida presents a difficult problem for the Democrats because even though Florida moved out of line, the Democrats are totally blameless. The Republican governor, the
Republican Legislature moved the Florida date up,” he said.

As for Michigan, Clinton said he thinks his wife won fair and square there, even though she was the only first-tier Democratic candidate on the ballot.

“In Michigan, she won, and there was a very determined local effort to get people to vote
against her and for uncommitted. But the other candidates voluntarily took their names off the ballot, I think, trying to help themselves in Iowa and because they knew she was going to win Michigan. … So I don’t know what is going to happen. It is sort of above my pay grade. I have no — I’m not involved in the negotiations between the campaigns,” he said.

Clinton acknowledged that his own party put the candidates in a difficult situation, but said it’s vital to have Michigan and Florida count because without them, voters may be inclined to stay home or protest the Democratic candidate by casting a ballot for presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain.

“We got a little carried away, our party did, I think, on that. But it still can be fixed. It can all be fixed,” he said. Clinton suggested that had Democrats adopted Republican rules of winner-take-all, Clinton would already have locked the nomination because she won big states. He also proposed getting rid of the caucuses system, and blamed it for the deadlock. Obama has won most of the caucuses states.

“I think that the party’s going to have to revisit its position on caucuses because of this. But the elections have been pretty normal, and as far as I know there have been no allegations of irregularities in the elections, as opposed to the caucuses. … These caucuses, like, blew up. Nobody ever thought there’d be this many people showing up. And they’re totally not designed and not fair for an election where you have a lot of general interests.”

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