INDEPENDENCE | "Go in. Buy something. Help small business," Hillary Clinton urged the media pool preceding her into Laree's Independence gift shop.
Clinton, the former first lady, U.S. senator, secretary of state and odds-on favorite to win the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, was in Northeast Iowa on Tuesday to continue a conversation with small business owners.
She held a roundtable with four regional business leaders at Bike Tech in Cedar Falls, which included about a dozen invited guests including three Democratic state lawmakers and several more media, before traveling to Independence to meet business owners in their shops.
“I’m running for president because everyday Americans and their families need a champion, and I want to be that champion,” Clinton said at Bike Tech. “I want to make the words ‘middle-class’ mean something again.”
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Clinton said she wants to be the president of small business and pointed to four areas she wants to address, if she’s elected next fall.
Those objectives are to cut red tape for small business, simplify their tax filing, increase targeted tax credits and make it easier for them to get financing. That latter goal was her main focus during the roundtable at Bike Tech, which featured the business’ owner Brent Johnson.
Clinton criticized Republicans for their “cynical attempt to game the system for those at the top” by supporting a full repeal of the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill.
Clinton said the country “ought to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time” by keeping the majority of Dodd-Frank in place to regulate big banks while not overburdening small banks that help small businesses.
Donna Sorensen, Cedar Rapids Bank and Trust board chairwoman, agreed with Clinton that the federal government ought to be able to regulate big banks and community banks differently. She noted other industries regulate based on size. She said that all banks need to be regulated but that the standards should be different.
The Republicans offered their own critiques of Clinton.
The Republican National Committee issued a press release criticizing Clinton’s professed championing of small business where she said in New Hampshire she was “very surprised’ to learn how small businesses are struggling.
The Republican Party of Iowa criticized a lack of transparency so far in Clinton’s campaign.
“What difference, at this point, does it make if Hillary Clinton answers one or two more questions? There are hundreds of unanswered questions about her decades of scandal, which explains why more Iowans than not find her untrustworthy,” Iowa GOP spokesman Charlie Szold said in a statement.
Clinton fielded five media questions following her Cedar Falls event, but iGUS Consulting owner Denita Gadson of Waterloo, was not shy during the roundtable about asking Clinton about some of the hot topics currently making news.
Gadson asked Clinton a question from one of her clients about helping young entrepreneurs to get started, specifically those who have a criminal past but are aiming now to get on the right track.
“It hasn’t taken their dreams away, but it has made it more difficult for them to pursue those dreams," Gadson said.
Clinton agreed some communities have to overcome much more to have small business growth, and supported finding ways for those communities to have access to tools to start to grow.
She also backed voting rights restorations for people with criminal backgrounds.
Gadson also asked about whether Clinton supported the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement.
Clinton said it depends what is in the agreement. She laid out some specifics of what she would want to see in a trade deal before she would accept it, including addressing currency manipulation by other countries, environmental and health regulations, and protecting jobs in the United States.
The Americans for Democratic Action -- Iowa protested outside Clinton’s roundtable on just that issue. About a dozen activists across the street from Bike Tech expressed their opposition to the proposed trade agreement and urged Clinton to give her opinion on it.
On the other end of the political spectrum, Judd Saul, a conservative activist with Cedar Valley Patriots for Christ, and a few other conservatives also came out to protest the event.
While Clinton’s Cedar Falls event focused on issues, her Independence stop was more about celebrating and supporting small businesses.
Her first stop was Em's Coffee Co., where Clinton ordered an espresso and placed an order for a sandwich before heading to Laree's. Em's Coffee Co . is run by Emile Hillman, 26, with help from her mother, Tami Fenner.
Clinton, a new grandmother, followed her own shop-local admonishment to reporters and picked up some gifts for her granddaughter, Charlotte.
Clinton bought a 2-in-1 talking plush ball and a farm animal plush barn that made farm noises. She also purchased a book titled "Theories of Everything” by Brian Andreas, an Iowan, which left her cracking up laughing and ultimately reading a passage to reporters.
"This was a great stop," Clinton said as owner Laree Randall totaled up Clinton's purchases.
Before heading to Laree's, Clinton met the owner of the local Hardware Hank store, Shirley Tekippe and her son, Terry Tekippe.
"I think it was wonderful. I think it was great she took time to stop in our small community," Terry Tekippe said.
Shirley Tekippe said she'd met the former first lady during her 2008 campaign for president. She remembers Clinton praised her pink sweater.
"She didn't have to do that," Shirley said.
"Hopefully, she remembers Main Street," Tekippe said of Clinton. "Main Street is important."
