Joseph Gerth

Opinion Columnist | Louisville Courier Journal

Hillary Clinton tried to shore up support from key Democratic constituencies on Sunday as she began her final push through Kentucky in advance of Tuesday's primary election.

The Democratic presidential front-runner attended church services at two African-American churches where she said she would attack "discrimination and systemic racism" and then rallied her supporters at a South Louisville union hall where she promised to rebuild the country's crumbling infrastructure.

"We can put millions of Americans to work," she said. "A lot of this will be good union jobs because the people with the skills to do the jobs will be able to do them."

In the churches, she got endorsements.

At St. Stephen Church in the West End, the Rev. Kevin Cosby called her "she who shall be the next president."

And at Canaan Christian Church on Hikes Lane, Sandra Malone, the church's "first lady" and wife of Pastor Walter Malone, asked the congregation to "join Pastor Malone and I by standing on your feet to receive who we pray will be the next president."

Clinton is trying to deal the final blow to the campaign of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and lock up the Democratic nomination prior to the Democratic National Convention at the end of July in Philadelphia. Despite a commanding lead in delegates, Clinton has lost 10 of the last 12 primary elections as Sanders has drawn large and enthusiastic crowds.

But after her husband, Bill Clinton, carried the state in 1992 and in 1996, and after she handily carried the state in 2008 in the Democratic primary against President Barack Obama, she is facing a surprisingly difficult time dispatching Sanders, who defines himself as a "democratic socialist."

5 takeaways from Clinton's Sunday in Louisville

She made that task even tougher in March when, while speaking at a town hall meeting in Ohio, said she would "put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business." She later said she the words simply came out wrong, but that didn't help last week when Sanders beat her handily in West Virginia.

Clinton was scheduled to visit Fort Mitchell later in the day before a full day of campaigning Monday in Bowling Green, Hopkinsville and then Lexington.

But in Louisville on Sunday, Clinton, didn't dwell on Sanders.

She never mentioned him in the churches and only spoke of him once at the Carpenters and Millwrights Training Center when she called for more advanced manufacturing jobs in the United States, including in the auto industry.

"There is a big difference in this primary campaign between me and my opponent, Bernie Sanders," she said. "I voted to bail out the auto industry, and he was against it. ... I wanted to save those millions of jobs."

She sounded a lot like Sanders, at one point, saying that under her, the federal government would crack down on businesses that don't give employees raises even as shareholders reap higher returns. She said she would improve the Affordable Care Act by reducing the cost of co-pays, premiums and prescription drugs.

Instead, she focused most of her fire on presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, questioning his ability to lead. She said he believes Americans are paid too much, and called his statements about allowing other countries to obtain nuclear weapons "reckless and risky. ... This is scary and dangerous talk. This is the talk of a loose cannon."

Former Gov. Steve Beshear, who introduced Clinton at the union hall, also used his time to criticize Trump's foreign policy credentials.

"We live right now in some of the most dangerous times that this world has ever seen," Beshear said. "The threat of nuclear proliferation, terrorists abroad and some at home and that position of Commander in Chief has never been more important than it is right now. You and I know that that the Commander in Chief has to be steady, has to be smart, has to be reasonable and has to be strong. And out of the two people this fall, are you kidding me?"