RNC Hoping to Draw Hillary Into 2016 Fray

With barely any Democratic opposition to speak of, the 2016 Republican candidates are busy fighting among themselves over key issues. As a result, it appears the Republican National Committee is somewhat goading Hillary to come out and engage the press on any given topic of the day. So far she’s been pretty quiet in 2015, tweeting only a handful of times, the latest on the topic of vaccines.

Report from the Weekly Standard:

The Republican National Committee is looking for Hillary Clinton. Which is why, according to a memo they’ve sent to the press, they’re asking, “Where’s Hillary?”

“We’ve noticed it. You’ve noticed it: Hillary Clinton is hiding,” reads the memo from Sean Spicer, communications director. “Potential Republican presidential candidates are out in public, speaking to voters, and sharing their ideas. But Hillary Clinton is nowhere to be found.”

Content from the RNC memo:

Well, we do know she tweeted.

Hillary’s only public appearances in 2015 have been in Canada. And in the previous year, almost every public appearance she made came with huge speaking fees—a quarter million dollars or more and, of course, a private jet.

As some of you have experienced first hand, when reporters are actually permitted to cover Mrs. Clinton, they are mistreated and even followed into the bathroom.

Why would a would-be presidential candidate behave this way? Because she’s made a strategic decision that the only way to ensure she is the Democratic nominee is to make everyone think she’s inevitable. The last time she had to face voters and actually compete for the nomination, she lost to a newcomer. She doesn’t want to make the same mistake twice.

As her poll numbers show, when Hillary is campaigning, she’s much less popular. What’s the only way not to seem like she’s campaigning? Go into hiding.

I think this is fairly telling that Hillary’s strategy of staying low is likely working, at least in the minds of her political opponents. I imagine a scenario where her strategists believe the only way she can avoid Hillary-fatigue with the public is to seemingly disappear until necessary. She’s got over two decades in the public eye since entering the White House with her husband in 1992. I suspect the RNC knows this which is why they’d like her to be front and center everyday, putting out statements on items in the news and giving Republican candidates a target to politically snipe at.

The latest news now is that her campaign announcement may not happen until July of this year which gives the RNC almost 6 months of intraparty fighting to referee.