Bill Clinton Stumps For California Democrats

Nostalgia for the 1990s is very in right now in pop culture. The same is true for Democratic politics. While Democratic candidates have been keeping President Barack Obama at arm’s length this fall, former President Bill Clinton has been campaigning all across the country.

On Wednesday, Clinton brought his road show to the campus of UC Davis, where he stumped for House Democrats Ami Bera and John Garamendi.

Clinton touched on a wide range of themes during his 20-minute speech -– everything from economics to history to Ebola to health care costs to, yes, how strong the economy was when he was president. But he kept circling back to one basic theme: urging the young,  largely Democratic crowd to vote on Tuesday.

“A different America shows up at most midterm elections than shows up in most presidential elections,” Clinton said.

That different America is typically much more conservative. And for Democrats like Bera, who won his suburban Sacramento seat by a razor-thin margin in 2012, that different electorate could mean a different outcome.

“This new politics of intense polarization, funded by outside money, designed to make you think that everyone in public life is some sort of a slug, is nuts,” Clinton said.

That’s a message that voters in the 7th Congressional District can probably relate to. They’ve been swamped with third-party attack ads aimed at both Bera and Republican Doug Ose. The race is one of the most closely watched and tightly contested in the country.

“It’s crazy, but it has a very particular purpose in this election,” said Clinton. “And that purpose is to get you to sit it out.”

Sacramento-area World Series viewers, who have been subjected to Bera or Ose commercials between what feels like every half-inning, could tell you that both parties are inundating the district with negative campaign ads.

Clinton is a candidate of the past, but he’ll likely be part of a future presidential campaign, too. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s likely 2016 run came up only once, when Bera said he hopes his daughter has a chance to vote for “the first woman president.”

Clinton stumped earlier in the day with Rep. Julia Brownley, whose Ventura County district also is among the races considered vulnerable for Democrats, and Pete Aguilar, who is running to succeed retiring Republican Rep. Gary Miller in another Southern California district that is considered a potential flip for Democrats.

Brownley welcomed Clinton's support, telling a crowd of about 1,200 at Oxnard College that introducing him was "the greatest honor of a lifetime."

The former president told an enthusiastic audience dominated by young Latinos that it was important for their futures to re-elect Brownley and send other Democrats to Congress, according to the Ventura County Star.

"We've got all our jobs back," he said of the recovery from the recession. "Now we can create the future. We must do it with equal opportunity for all."

This post contains reporting from the Associated Press.