Letter to the Editor: Sharing My Support for Clinton

I am thrilled to support Hillary Clinton’s candidacy for president; her decades of hard work to help the most vulnerable amongst us are an inspiration. She has made positive differences in people’s lives on a scale inconceivable to most of us. She learned from her mother, an abandoned child who supported herself by working as a housemaid while still a teenager, that this is a great, opportunity-filled country, but that more must be done to help those in need. After graduating from Yale Law School, Hillary Clinton could’ve gone to work for a fancy law firm, but instead she chose the Children’s Defense Fund, and worked to ensure that all children, no matter disability, income, or race, had access to good schooling. When she moved to Arkansas, she taught law, worked in child advocacy, and ran legal clinics for the poor. As First Lady, she led the fight to create the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which provides health coverage to more than eight million poor children. She worked to improve foster care and adoption, and still reserves intern slots for former foster kids. As a Senator, she awed colleagues of both parties with her humility and hard work, and her willingness to reach across the aisle, fighting to ensure that 9/11 first responders, members of the Reserves and the National Guard and their families got better health care. She pioneered new programs to help rural residents and farmers succeed. As Secretary of State, she was a champion for human rights, focusing on the needs of women and girls, and had a remarkable 69 percent approval rating at the end of her term. Through the Clinton Foundation, she has helped millions of HIV/AIDS patients get access to low-cost medication, and worked to help alleviate poverty and environmental problems.

During this election season, as I’ve knocked on doors, or struck up conversations with friends and strangers, I’ve heard so much support for Secretary Clinton, and so many reasons for it. People who are proud to support the woman who went to Beijing and declared that “women’s rights are human rights.” People who are excited to see a woman of faith doing good works. People who want a leader who believes that our government must stay out of our most private personal decisions. People of both parties who want to entrust our military and nuclear arsenal to an experienced, steady “grown-up.” I’m struck by how discussion reveals how much more we Americans agree on than we disagree on, and by how much more we could accomplish if we could work together and cooperate more. I know that Hillary Clinton believes this, and that is why I, and so many of my fellow citizens, will be voting for her.

Melissa Clark

Sturgeon Bay, Wis.