ORONO, Maine — Mike Gingras came to see Chelsea Clinton campaign for her mother at the University of Maine because the values his parents taught him growing up in Winthrop are the values espoused by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
Those values include “being accepted for who you are, no matter what,” Gingras, who is an African-American adoptee of white parents, said after the event.
Gingras, 28, of Old Town was one of about 175 people who attended the event Thursday at the Wells Conference Center. A recent graduate of UMaine, he works in behavioral health care in Bangor.
“Growing up in Maine was a real positive experience until I came here to go to school and began driving home,” he said. “I’ve been pulled over numerous times driving home just because I’m black.”
Gingras said he has already cast his absentee ballot for Clinton.
“I see her vision as unifying our country as opposed to Donald Trump’s,” he said.
The event drew a crowd that included students, faculty and senior citizens. Chelsea Clinton spoke for about 15 minutes and took questions from the audience. She spoke in detail about her mother’s policies on health care, student debt, environmental sustainability, affordable child care, criminal justice and how to talk to angry voters who favor Trump.
“[Hillary Clinton’s] opponent doesn’t have comprehensive plans in any of those areas,” Chelsea Clinton said. “I’m really proud of her more than 30 years of public service. And, I’m really proud that she does sweat the details, even though her opponent often criticizes her for being too prepared. Because if it’s your child, or it’s your family or if it’s the future of our planet, those [policy initiatives] aren’t details.”
She urged everyone at the event to talk with family, friends, neighbors and strangers about why they should vote for her mother.
“I feel this is a very high-stakes election like everyone else,” Nancy Patterson, 68, of Ellsworth said.
She said that Chelsea Clinton’s statement that her mother believed health care did not just apply to what happens from the neck down resonated with Patterson.
“People who are very dear to me have mental health needs,” she said.
Former Sen. George Mitchell was unable to attend because of illness, according to organizers, but local Democratic politicians were in the audience.
“This is now a battle for our democracy,” Rep. Ryan Tipping-Spitz, D-Orono, told the crowd.
Tipping-Spitz, who supported Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in the primary, urged attendees to talk to neighbors and friends about why they should vote for Hillary Clinton.
“We know exactly what kind of president Donald Trump will be because we know what kind of governor Paul LePage has been,” the lawmaker said.
Maine is being treated as a battleground state, in part, because of Trump’s strength in the 2nd Congressional District.
A poll released Wednesday showed Clinton with an 11-point statewide lead over Trump, 44 percent to 36 percent, in a four-way race.
According to the new poll by the progressive Maine People’s Resource Center, an affiliate of the Maine People’s Alliance, Clinton was within two percentage points of Trump in the crucial 2nd Congressional District, 39 percent to 40 percent, in a four-way race.
Those totals, which result from phone and online surveys of 892 voters Oct. 7 through 9, reflect a significantly improved standing for Clinton compared with a September poll from the same organization. That poll had Clinton virtually tied statewide and 11 points down in the 2nd Congressional District. Her lead in the 1st District remains commanding.
Hanging in the balance is one of Maine’s four electoral votes, which the Trump camp has been pursuing aggressively with three trips to Maine for the candidate so far and another scheduled for Saturday in Bangor.
According to the Maine People’s Resource Center, the latest poll does not account for the full impact of the release last week of the 2005 tape of Trump making lewd comments about sexual assault of women because some of the polling was done before that release. It also doesn’t reflect Sunday’s presidential debate and comes just after the release of new documents in the Clinton email scandal that could damage Clinton moving forward.
The poll suggests that in Maine, preference is shifting slightly to Clinton from two third-party candidates in the race. The latest survey also indicates a decreasing number of undecided voters in the race. Libertarian Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein garnered 8.8 percent and 2.9 percent, respectively, and 8.2 percent were undecided. All three of those numbers were down by about two points.
Clinton’s increased lead and Trump’s static support suggest that his base is solid but perhaps at or near its ceiling.
The poll has a margin of error of 3.3 percent.
BDN writer Chris Cousins contributed to this report.