Clinton doesn’t mention Obama by name at event

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) did not mention Barack Obama’s name once during a speech to a women’s group on Tuesday and instead urged attendees to back the Democratic Party.

Many of Clinton’s supporters attended the private event, held by Women Count, a nonprofit organization focused on women’s issues. WomenCount PAC was created in May in response to pressure for Clinton to bow out of the presidential race.

{mosads}Clinton, accompanied by her daughter, Chelsea, was the star speaker at the private forum, which had several hundred attendees, said Toni Leigh, a Clinton supporter from Taos, N.M., who attended.

While Clinton urged the women in the room to support the Democratic Party, she did not ask them directly to support Sen. Obama (D-Ill.) or mention his name, said Leigh.

The reason she did not mention Obama’s name was that “she was sensitive to her supporters,” Leigh told The Hill. “We are hurting right now; we are in pain. We do not know Obama.”

Catherine Couch, of Kansas City, Mo., who also attended, said that Clinton has already “bent over backwards” and was “gracious” to support Obama. “I do not think it was obligatory to mention Obama’s name,” Couch told The Hill. “She was there to support women and those who supported her.” Couch, a Clinton supporter, will vote for Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), she said.

The Huffington Post, which posted a video of the speech , reported that Clinton once referred to Obama and Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) as “the nominees.” According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Clinton's campaign insisted that her remarks to the event stay off the record.

Rosemary Camposano, a spokeswoman for WomenCount, said that Clinton was at the organization's event to support the creation of an online community for women: "She was specifically trying not to focus on the campaign," but rather on "what women need to focus on from here on out," in terms of issues of importance to them.

Both Leigh and Couch attended a pro-Clinton reception Tuesday evening in Denver sponsored by the Denver Group, which is an ad-hoc organization launched in June to highlight what it sees as major problems in the Democratic nomination process. The group has no affiliation with Clinton. At least 40 people showed up at the Denver Group reception.

Denver Group co-founder Heidi Li Feldman said she ran into former Democratic National Committee Chairman and Clinton operative Terry McAuliffe in Denver. According to Feldman, he told her, “Knock 'em dead.”

Clinton’s office did not comment for this article.