DES MOINES -- Chelsea Clinton attacking Bernie Sanders’ healthcare plan.

Clinton money pouring into the Iowa airwaves to catch up with Sanders.


Combative conference calls challenging the policy proposals of the chief Democratic rival.

With three weeks to go until the Iowa caucuses, the Clinton campaign is finding itself in an unpleasantly familiar position. They are watching the polls tighten uncomfortably -- a 13-percentage-point drop nationally in the last month -- as they go on the attack against an authentic, inspirational candidate with a clarion message and momentum on his side.

For months, it seemed like Clinton had shed the demons of 2008 as she logged the hours and miles listening to the concerns of regular Iowans and building a sturdy organization on the ground. But as Sanders’ campaign has improved its own organization across the state, her allies are having flashbacks from the caucus eight years ago, which propelled Barack Obama to victory and marked the beginning of the end for Clinton.

“I’m getting a little PTSD on the whole Iowa thing,” said one 2008 veteran. “It’s a little troublesome to watch. The whole lack of enthusiasm, someone gaining momentum on her -- that’s the troubling thing.”

“If I were them, I’d be sweating a little bit,” said Mo Elleithee, who served as Clinton’s traveling press secretary from 2008 and spent the two months leading up to the caucus working on the ground in Iowa. “I think they are in a better position to withstand a late surge than they were last time. Is it enough to win Iowa? I don’t know.” He conceded that while Sanders might not be able to replicate the Obama model from eight years ago, “he’s running a tremendously effective grassroots campaign.”

In response, Clinton is increasing her ad buys to achieve parity with Sanders -- who has been outspending her here for the past three weeks -- in the major markets across the state, according to a source familiar with the ad buys.

And she is ramping up her own attacks on healthcare and gun control, and employing her entire campaign -- and even family members -- to amplify the message.

“Sen. Sanders has some very big ideas, but he hasn't yet told anybody how he would pay for them,” Clinton said in a CNN interview Tuesday night. “He had promised that he would roll out his tax plans before the Iowa caucus on February 1. Well, if you wait too long, nobody will have a chance to see them or analyze them.”

On a conference call with reporters Wednesday, Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon said Sanders was “depriving Iowa caucus voters of the full details” of his healthcare plan and how he would pay for it.

“They do their homework,” he said, “they should know how Sen. Sanders would achieve it. This is a major detail for Sen. Sanders to withhold. It’s not becoming and it’s not worthy of the caucus-goers in Iowa.” Senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan added that Sanders is “studiously avoiding” detailing the tax side of his healthcare plan because he does not want to admit it requires raising taxes on working families.

In response to the attacks, a Sanders spokesman noted that Clinton had once said it “undermined core Democratic values” for Democrats to attack each other’s healthcare plans, and accused her of “using the same Karl Rove tactics she once decried.”

But allies said they worried the strategy of a concerted stream of attacks looked desperate and that some of messengers were wrong -- particularly Chelsea Clinton, who on her first day on the campaign trail warned that Sanders would “dismantle Obamacare.” (Sullivan said Wednesday that her comment was not planned and was in response to a question.)

“It’s going to get more heated here in the final weeks,” Elleithee said. “You’re in a tight race and you need to look for the competitive advantage you’ve got. That means pointing out the differences. I don’t know that the average Iowa caucus-goer is going to care about whether or not it looks desperate -- they’re just soaking in the information.”

But the Sanders surge is real, and people close to the campaign say his swift rise in the past few weeks is the product of an imperfect storm of factors — big Sanders ad buys in Iowa and New Hampshire; the campaign's own failure to make a convincing counter-case against his claim that Clinton is beholden to Wall Street; and a relentless barrage of attacks from the Republicans against the candidate and former President Bill Clinton.

“The right has not bothered attacking Bernie,” said Stuart Appelbaum, executive vice president of the UFCW union that on Tuesday endorsed Clinton. “He is getting a pass where there are no negatives represented by the Republicans, who have not even mentioned him in the debates, or brought up the issues people think he could be attacked on.”

Clinton said in an interview she was "excited about where we are" and "not nervous," even as a New York Times/CBS News poll released Tuesday showed her 20-point national lead from just a month ago has dwindled to just seven points.

Clinton allies contend that while Sanders must win Iowa to prove he is a viable candidate, there's no single must-win state for the former secretary of state -- she could still clinch her party’s nomination even if she lost the first two early states. It’s not, however, a theory anyone is eager to test.

“Momentum matters, narrative matters,” warned Elleithee. “The results in Iowa can impact the trajectory of the race. She was leading in South Carolina by double-digits until the day Obama won Iowa. And the next day the bottom fell out.”

