There are no ads ripping Donald Trump on the swing state airwaves, and no formal Republicans-for-Hillary effort has surfaced. Trumpet-blaring shows of Democratic Party unity are nonexistent.

Other than a daily stream of news releases, surrogate calls, Web videos and campaign trail broadsides, the public turn toward Trump by Hillary Clinton’s campaign in the two weeks since he became the presumptive GOP nominee has been a far cry from the kind of scorched earth offensive that’s likely to be necessary to stop him this fall.


It’s not entirely Clinton’s fault. Her hands are tied.

She can’t switch her campaign apparatus into general-election mode because of the risk of alienating Bernie Sanders’ supporters, who continue to hold out hope that he will emerge as the Democratic nominee. She can’t organize disaffected Republicans without exposing herself to criticism from liberals who already accuse Clinton of being too far to the right. Then there’s the ongoing primary: Short of the magic delegate number in her fight against Sanders, she’s still forced to burn ad dollars in places like Kentucky, a state that holds a Democratic primary Tuesday but won’t be competitive in November.

“People, both in the campaign and supporters, are generally frustrated because the outcome is not in doubt but we’re all acting as if math is not a science,” said one former congressional Democrat who is close to Clinton, noting that the candidate herself has been especially careful not to express that concern out loud, even in private. “There is a material deleterious effect to the situation that we’re in. This isn’t just, ‘Oh, how interesting that Republicans got settled first.’ There is a whole situation with the Republicans jumping ahead of us.”

The frustration is beginning to show. A fundraising email sent to rank-and-file backers on Friday spelled it out: “Right now, Hillary is the only candidate waging two campaigns, which means we need twice as many resources as Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump.”

The problem, as many of Clinton’s allies see it, isn’t simply that Republicans are getting a head start on November while Clinton must spend time and resources on Sanders. It’s that Democrats may have an unprecedented opportunity to win over the significant number of GOP voters who say they will not support Trump at the top of the ticket — and the Clinton campaign is unable to take full advantage.

“As the realization of Donald Trump comes in for senators, [Democratic House Minority Leader] Nancy Pelosi and others, it becomes very serious as to what our opportunities are now that didn’t exist [before Trump became the presumptive nominee], to potentially take the House back, take the Senate back,” said Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, a Clinton backer, peering toward the end of the Democratic primary. “So that reality is going to circle around all Democrats. These opportunities don’t come around very often, so we need to be sure we take advantage. The momentum of that possibility should speed this process along.”

But with the Democratic Party political machinery formally out of service until her nomination is official, Clinton has been unable to exploit the Republican division. She held events in Northern California the day after GOP House Speaker Paul Ryan’s recent announcement that he wasn’t ready to support Trump, but didn’t appear with Pelosi on her home turf. Pelosi, who has yet to officially endorse Clinton — she has said it’s because she doesn’t want to depress voter turnout in other races — was instead returning from a trip abroad.

Without the benefit of a coordinated messaging program that would fall into place once there is an official nominee, Clinton’s campaign has been sounding a different tune about Republicans than some of her party’s campaign committees. While the Brooklyn-based effort has focused on highlighting GOP leaders’ distance from Trump with a Web video and a series of campaign emails, operatives working on House and Senate campaigns have sought to tie individual candidates to Trump as part of an effort to brand them as too extreme.

Even Clinton’s campaign schedule reflects the current uncertainty. Despite allies’ pleas to branch out into general election swing states, she has held just two open events in Ohio and Virginia in recent weeks, intent on remaining in places with upcoming primaries lest she appear to be looking too far beyond Sanders.

Still, some of Clinton's fundraisers recently began actively reaching out to Republican campaign donors, particularly those associated with Jeb Bush, and Clinton herself has talked about her intention to woo Republicans in television interviews.

But even those initial steps have come at a cost. Top allies of Sanders — who remains in the race despite facing long odds — have reacted with suspicion, and some disbelief, at Clinton’s initial attempts to win over GOP voters, viewing it as proof that the former secretary of state is no true progressive.

The senator’s camp recently blasted out via email the full text of a series of news stories about Clinton’s attempts to win over specific Republicans, an attempt to remind Clinton that she still has work to do to unify her own party before she can fully turn her attention to leveraging the Republicans’ divide.

The Sanders team also sent his backers a fundraising note based on a Politico report about Clinton supporters’ mission to bring on GOP donors, headlined, “Hillary Clinton’s ‘right-wing mega-donors’” — parroting the description Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook chose early in the campaign cycle to describe Bush’s funders. Signed by Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver, the missive said Democrats have a chance to take “our democracy back from the oligarchy that Trump and Jeb Bush represent.”

“Going after the Bush Rangers on Wall Street is every bit the proof of what we have said all along: You can’t trust her on this front, and that’s really where they are and where they come from,” said a senior Sanders aide.

But Clinton can’t afford to veer too far left either, fear some of her supporters — not if she hopes to win over many Republicans in November.

“Look, not every Republican is an insane person like Donald Trump, or Ted Cruz, or et cetera,” said one New York-based Clinton fundraiser. “You have a couple — Mark Salter [a long-time John McCain aide] — people like that are endorsing Hillary. But how many [will] follow if she’s having to appeal to the Bernie crowd?”

“Thinking and sane Republicans who are so horrified at Trump that they really might vote for her or support her, or contribute to her? If she keeps lurching to the left to please Bernie, it’s going to become less likely [that they’ll back her].”

Daniel Strauss contributed to this report.

