IRVINE – Former President Bill Clinton was greeted with a loud standing ovation Tuesday evening at UC Irvine, while a sea of cellphones held overhead in the near-full, 5,000-capacity Bren Event Center captured the moment hundreds of times over.

Then Clinton got down to a favorite chore – repeatedly rousing a large crowd with his oratory skills, this time on behalf of both President Barack Obama and a team of five Southern California congressional candidates.

His 35-minute speech started with echoes of his highly touted speech at the Democratic National Convention last month.

“Here’s what I know,” he told the gymnasium full of mostly students. ” ‘We’re all in this together’ works a lot better than ‘You’re on your own.’ Shared opportunity works a lot better than trickle-down economics. Arithmetic works better than illusion.”

Occasionally glancing at notes but ad-libbing freely, Clinton spent much of his time touting the five candidates who shared the stage with him and explaining how the individual experience of each was crucial to furthering Democratic values and Obama’s agenda in Congress.

The sole candidate vying for an Orange County seat was state Sen. Alan Lowenthal, D-Long Beach, who is facing Long Beach City Councilman Gary DeLong, a Republican, in a newly drawn district that extends from Long Beach to Westminster. Clinton’s main talking point for Lowenthal was his work as a state legislator in working with port businesses to develop a plan to cut down on pollution.

“He helped make the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach the cleanest and greenest in the world,” Clinton said.

He then took a brief detour to criticize Mitt Romney’s proposed tax cuts before circling back to the issue of pollution and global warming. “We have got to increase scientific knowledge. No where else in the world is there a major political party that denies climate change. (Lowenthal) should be elected on that issue alone.”

Clinton also urged a “Yes” vote on Proposition 30, Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed temporary tax increase to stave off further education cuts, and a “No” vote on Proposition 32, which would make it harder for unions to deduct members’ dues for political purposes.

The other congressional candidates on the stage were San Diego’s Scott Peters, Riverside’s Mark Takano, Ventura County’s Julia Brownley and the Coachella Valley’s Raul Ruiz. Each spoke briefly before Clinton’s introduction. Lowenthal, a white man from Long Beach, enthused that he would be a Democrat representing an increasingly diverse Orange County.

“We are changing the face of Orange County,” he said. “Orange County is no longer just white people.”

It was Clinton’s first public appearance in Orange County since October 2010, when he held a rally for about 1,000 people for Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Santa Ana, at the Old Orange County Courthouse. Sanchez was also on hand Tuesday, though in the audience this time. It was the counmty’s biggest political rally of the season, outnumbering the approximately 4,000 people – mostly students – Ron Paul attracted to Cal State Fullerton in May.

Two weeks ago, Clinton appeared at UC Davis to endorse four Northern California congressional candidates. And again Tuesday, Clinton argued the case that it wasn’t enough to re-elect Obama – that the congressional candidates needed to be elected to strengthen Democrats’ standing in the House, which is now controlled by Republicans.

“If you want not only to re-elect President Obama,” Clinton said in closing, “but to see him in a position to enact a second-term agenda that will create a 21st Century America of prosperity, you have to vote for them.”

Contact the writer: 714-796-6753 or mwisckol@ocregister.com