Former Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) on Wednesday said that Hillary Clinton sounds smug when discussing how she would regulate the coal industry.
“I think it is more arrogance,” he said on Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria.” “She certainly sounds very arrogant — ‘I did this, I’ll do this.’ ”
{mosads}Clinton on Monday encountered a chilly reception in coal country because of her past remarks about shrinking the industry in favor or renewable energy sources.
Bo Copley, a former coal company employee and an uncommitted registered Republican, confronted Clinton over her plans for coal.
“This is my family,” Copley said before handing Clinton a picture. “My hope is in God, and that’s my future. I want my family to know that they have a future in this state because it is a great state. I’ve lived my entire life here.”
“I just want you to know: How can you say you’re going to put a lot of coal miners out of jobs and then come in here and tell us you’re going to be our friend?” he asked in Williamson, W.Va. “Those people out there don’t see you as a friend.”
Clinton angered the coal industry in March by saying that her energy policies would put it out of business.
“I’m the only candidate which has a policy about how to bring economic opportunity — using clean, renewable energy as the key — into coal country,” she said on March 14. “We’re going to put a lot of coal companies and coal miners out of business. We’re going to make it clear that we don’t want to forget those people.”
Clinton on Monday said her past remarks were a “misstatement,” adding she is a “little bit sad and sorry” it offended voters in coal country.
Paul said that Clinton and other lawmakers are missing the bounty that coal could provide the economy.
“What they fail to see is the big picture, which isn’t a very popular thing to look at in politics,” he said.
“I happen to think it is very valuable, and it’s been around and would be, but with so many regulations and interferences with the interest rates, you get so much distortion and you cause this unemployment.”