Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton was joined by President Barack Obama in Charlotte Tuesday for their first joint campaign rally.
The event drew roughly 9,500 people in total to the Charlotte Convention Center, which made this event the largest to date of Clinton’s campaign, according to CNN. Among the guests were North Carolina attorney general and Democratic candidate for governor, Roy Cooper, and U.S. Senate candidate Deborah Ross, both of whom also gave speeches.
In his first public appearance with Clinton on the campaign trail, Obama described the importance of electing her this November.
“I’m here today because I believe in Hillary Clinton,” Obama said at the rally. “Hillary Clinton has to be the next president of the United States.”
Obama repeated his talking point of Clinton being the most qualified candidate for the job, even going so far as mocking the presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, although not by name.
“Even Republicans on the other side don’t really know what the guy’s talking about,” Obama said. “They don’t … Am I joking? No.”
Just a few hours later, Trump held a campaign rally at the Duke Energy Center for the Performing Arts in Raleigh, slamming Clinton in his speech.
“She can’t protect her emails and she can’t protect the country,” Trump said to a crowd of more than 2,000.
The question of why the president and Clinton chose their first joint-campaign stop in Charlotte is due to North Carolina being a need-to-win swing state, with a tight race between Clinton and Trump. The same reason drove Trump to speak in Raleigh.
According to polls conducted by Real Clear Politics, North Carolina is polling with Clinton at 44 percent of votes and Trump at 43.3 percent, according to The Charlotte Observer. No Republican has won the presidency without carrying North Carolina since Dwight Eisenhower in 1956.
Although not known by many in attendance, the event might have been overshadowed by FBI Director James Comey’s announcement earlier in the day, regarding the hotly contested email controversy.
Although the director said he would not recommend charges to be filed against Clinton, he called her actions “extremely careless.”
“Although we did not clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information,” Comey said, “there is evidence that they were extremely careless in the handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.”
No mention of this announcement was made at the rally.
Although the president did most of the speaking during the rally, Clinton made a point of emphasizing her friendship with Obama and why they had become so close after being rivals in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary.
“I’ve known the president in many roles,” Clinton said. “But I’ve also known him as the friend that I was honored to stand with in the good times and the hard times.”
Obama told the crowd that there was no candidate as prepared to fight for Americans as Clinton.
“I am ready to pass the baton,” Obama said. “I know that Hillary Clinton is going to take it, and I know she’s going to run that race.”
After the event, Obama and Clinton stopped at Midwood Smokehouse, a local barbecue restaurant in the Plaza Midwood section of Charlotte, before boarding Air Force One.
According to aides, the president’s order included pulled pork, brisket and a variety of sides, while Clinton and her entourage ordered a chicken and ribs combo.
