On the stump in Bucks, Kaine rallies support for Democratic ticket

Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine rallied voters in Bucks County Wednesday, making the case for a Hillary Clinton presidency in a campaign with less than two weeks left.

Kaine talked up the difference between Clinton’s economic platform and that of Republican nominee Donald Trump.

In particular, Kaine told a crowd at Bucks County Community College that college affordability is something he and Clinton plan to make a top priority.

“It is easier to refinance a loan on a corporate jet or a yacht or a vacation home, then it is to refinance a student loan. That makes no sense,” Kaine said. “That’s something we can change, we ought to change, and if Hillary and I are in, we’re going to make that change.”

He addressed older voters, too, saying protecting and boosting retirement benefits as a federal program is a cornerstone of the Democrats’ platform.

“On the other side, Donald Trump wrote a book in the early 2000s and said Social Security was a Ponzi scheme and that privatization would have been a good idea,” Kaine said. “This would have been a disaster.”

Kaine said though most polls show that the gap between Clinton and Trump is widening, no voter should sit out this election.

“Polls have been wrong. Pundits have been wrong,” Kaine said. “The GOP nominated someone that most people didn’t think would get the GOP nomination. We can’t take anything for granted, we’re living in a season of surprises.”

Kaine ended by saying more than two centuries after the U.S. Constitution was written in Philadelphia — and after Clinton was nominated as the party’s nominee in the city — it’s time for the greater Philadelphia area to help elect the country’s first woman president.

That message inspired Solebury resident Beth Schulz.

“I’m really excited about the idea of the first woman president, and having heard Kaine speak, I’m even more impressed and more concerned about getting the vote out,” she said.

On Friday, Kaine’s vice presidential rival Mike Pence will be stopping in Bensalem to make the opposite pitch.