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 If elected in November 2016, Clinton would be, at 69, the
second-oldest person to take the presidential oath for the first
time, behind only Ronald Reagan, who turned 70 weeks after being
sworn into office in 1981.
Questions of health and fitness for the presidency dogged two former
candidates of a similar age, Bob Dole in the 1996 election and John
McCain in 2008, each of whom was 71 at this point in the race. Time
magazine featured Dole on the cover asking whether he was "too old"
for the job. McCain was so determined to show that he was healthy
that he often put in back-breaking campaign days.
"I do think age is an issue in a presidential campaign," said Steve
Schmidt, who was McCain’s campaign manager. "There is a thin line
between seasoned and decrepit."
But several Republican campaigns that seem best positioned to
exploit it don't want to touch the issue - at least directly. That's
a shift from just a few months ago, when presidential hopefuls
Senator Rand Paul, 52, and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, 47,
explicitly referenced Clinton’s age as a possible disqualifier, and
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell likened her to a cast member
of the hit TV show “The Golden Girls,” which featured four older
women living together.
"It’s a rigorous physical ordeal, I think, to be able to campaign
for the presidency," Paul said in November, referring to Clinton's
age. Now, however, Paul’s presidential campaign doesn’t want to talk
about the issue. It declined further comment. As did Walker’s
political action committee, even though last fall, he, too, noted
that he could run for president "20 years from now" and be the same
age Clinton is today.
Campaign aides to Paul, Walker and Senator Marco Rubio, 43, as well
as Republican strategists, told Reuters there was little appetite in
the party at the moment for a direct assault on Clinton on the
issues of her age and fitness for office, even after a 2012 fall
that gave her a concussion and caused a potentially life-threatening
blood clot.
Similarly, anti-Clinton political action committees such as American
Crossroads, America Rising, and Citizens United said they had no
plans to launch ads centered on her age.
POLL SHOWS DEMOCRATS UNFAZED
"It’s unwise to attack a political opponent based on her immutable
characteristics, like race, gender and age," said Republican
pollster Kellyanne Conway. She said she has met with at least five
Republican presidential campaigns seeking her services and none of
them has indicated they want to go after Clinton on issues involving
her age.
With Clinton swamped by questions about foreign donations to the
Clinton Foundation and criticism of her use of a private email
server while at the State Department, there is also simply no reason
at the moment to engage in an attack that could be more divisive
than beneficial, Republican strategists said.
They fear that highlighting Clinton’s age could alienate women
voters whom Republicans need to be competitive in next year’s
general election.
Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg said women older than 50 would
likely comprise the largest bloc of voters in 2016.
There is little evidence that Democrats and independent voters are
concerned about having another president in their 70s. A
Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted this month showed that Clinton’s age
would not influence how 67 percent of Democrats and 72 percent of
independents voted in November 2016.
And rather than downplay her age, Clinton in recent campaign events
in Iowa and New Hampshire embraced her role as a grandmother,
striking sympathetic notes with other older women in the room about
the responsibility of raising a grandchild.
Supporters have also sought to dismiss any concerns about her age as
sexist, noting that she’s the same age as Mitt Romney when he ran
four years ago. Romney largely avoided any protracted discussion
about his health.
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IT'S A GENERATIONAL THING
While eschewing direct attacks, some of the Republican presidential
hopefuls have found other ways to strongly hint that Clinton's age
should be an issue for voters. They have repackaged the issue as
"generational" and suggested she is a product of the politics of the
20th Century. That argument will grow more vivid should Clinton face
a candidate who could be a generation younger than her in the
general election.
“When you look at Hilary Clinton’s age, it becomes an issue in a
general election if she’s running against a 40-something new face as
opposed to Governor Bush,” said Schmidt. Jeb Bush, the former
Florida governor, is 62.
Rubio, a quarter century younger than Clinton, referred to her as a
"leader from yesterday" when he announced his candidacy last month.
"We welcome the contrast (with Clinton)," said a top adviser to
Rubio. "This election is going to be about the future."
Clinton's campaign declined to comment on the various statements by
the Republican hopefuls, referring questions to Correct the Record,
a rapid-response operation run by the pro-Clinton group American
Bridge. A spokeswoman, Adrienne Watson, said it was Clinton's
rivals, not her, who were behind the times.
"Republican politicians are stuck in the 90s - the 1890s," Watson
said. "I'm sure all Americans, Republicans included, would
appreciate it if Republican leaders would join (Clinton) in talking
about our future."
She saw Rubio's comments as a coded attack on Clinton's age.
"Marco Rubio basically disqualifies himself to be president when he
diminishes any American for being too young or old or anything
else," Watson said.
BILL CLINTON'S PLAYBOOK
Yet Rubio's approach is similar to the one employed by Clinton’s
husband, Bill, in his reelection campaign against Dole in 1996.
"I don't think Senator Dole is too old to be president,” Clinton
said at one debate. “It's the age of his ideas that I question."
Dick Morris, who served as Bill Clinton’s campaign manager, said it
was a subtle enough way to remind voters of the age difference
between the two candidates.
"We obviously couldn’t attack age directly because of older voters,"
Morris told Reuters. "What we did is adopt a whole strategy based on
issues that would summon the memories and ideas of age without
articulating it."
Dole released his medical records in 1995 to assuage concerns about
his age. But the damage control was not entirely successful: he
mistakenly called the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team “Brooklyn,”
and he tumbled off a stage during a rally.
Hillary Clinton, too, had what her husband seemed to term a “senior”
moment in 2008 when she erroneously claimed she had come under
sniper fire while on a trip to Bosnia as first lady.
Bill Clinton blamed the episode on his wife being exhausted, adding
that her critics, “when they’re 60, they’ll forget something when
they’re tired at 11 at night, too.”
(Editing by Ross Colvin)
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