Former US President Bill Clinton claimed on Sunday that while Republicans will work to "just scare people" in the run-up to the November midterm elections, Democrats may be able to keep control of Congress.
In an interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria, Clinton expressed his belief that Democrats "could hold both these houses."
"But we have to say the right things, and we have to note the Republicans always close well,” he added. “Why? Because they find some new way to scare the living daylights out of swing voters about something."
Democrats gained five seats in the House during Clinton's second term in office, marking the first time in decades that a sitting president's party gained seats in the midterm elections. Clinton admitted that the parties have become more polarized recently but claimed the breaking point in American politics today is "not much different" than it was when he was president.
"It’s just that there’s so many fewer because as the parties have gone more ideological and clear and somehow psychically intolerant, they pull more and more of people toward the extremes,” he said. “But there’s still some people hanging on there who are really trying to think and trying to understand what’s going on."
As he compared former President Donald Trump's unwillingness to concede the 2020 election loss to his wife Hillary Clinton's concession speech in the 2016 presidential election, Clinton told Zakaria that the globe is engaged in a war against divisive populism.
The Republican Party's closing argument in the run-up to the midterm elections, which are now less than two months away, was foreshadowed by Clinton.
"That’s what they did in 2021 — where they made critical race theory sound worse than smallpox," he asserted. "And it wasn’t being taught in any public schools in America. But they didn’t care. They just scare people."
Republicans unexpectedly performed well in New Jersey's gubernatorial race in part by mobilizing voters, especially parents, over both the teaching of race in schools and COVID-19-induced school closures. Republicans also swept the top three statewide offices in Virginia in 2021, which had previously been trending toward Democrats.
Since Clinton took office in the 1990s, there has been an increase in partisanship and polarization, which has reduced the number of swing voters and those prepared to vote outside their party, according to experts.
Besides the political issues, Clinton was questioned by Zakaria over the recent passing of Ken Starr. The tenacious special prosecutor, who died at the age of 76, relentlessly looked into the Clintons' real estate activities in Arkansas as part of the Whitewater investigation. Following that, the focus of the inquiry turned to Clinton's extramarital relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky, which grew to be the largest scandal of his presidency and resulted in his impeachment.
"Well, I read the obituary, and I realized that his family loved him, and I think that's something to be grateful for, and when your life is over that's all there is to say," the former president said. "But I was taught not to talk about people that I — you know. I have nothing to say. Except I'm glad he died with the love of his family."