Clinton and her fans eager to change campaign discourse

There is less than a week until Americans vote for their next president.

That is why Denny Gibbs, of Sanford, Florida, is doing all she can to help Hillary Clinton. She works in a full-time job, but when she is not working, she is posting on social media, to try and convince undecided voters to support the Democratic presidential nominee.

“I’m an active poster. I try to correct facts that are wrong and challenge with articles from fair websites,” Gibbs said.

At a Clinton rally, Gibbs expressed frustration with campaign discourse and how she believes voters focus only on the latest media sound bite, and not what she called “real facts”.

A number of regional polls now show Trump with a narrow lead in the swing state of Florida. One national poll released on Tuesday shows Clinton and Trump virtually tied.

Enthusiasm for Clinton’s candidacy has waned among some of her supporters following the announcement by the FBI director, James Comey, on Friday, that the agency was investigating hundreds, perhaps thousands of Clinton emails uncovered in an unrelated investigation.

The Clinton campaign has assailed Comey for a pronouncement they have called “unprecedented” so close to an election. It is demanding answers as to why the FBI isn’t also updating American voters on the status of an ongoing investigation into the hacked emails published online by WikiLeaks, belonging to Democratic Party members, including Clinton campaign chairman, John Podesta.

“It’s totally unfair and breaks all the rules of law and ethics, J Gabriel Puyana, of Orlando, said, as he waited hours for Clinton to appear at her second Florida rally of the day in the town of Sanford.

The Clinton campaign has repeatedly suggested that Russia is behind the hacks, in an effort to influence the outcome of the US election in favour of her Republican opponent, Donald Trump.

READ MORE: 10 juicy and quirky emails from the WikiLeaks dump

Orlando voter Frank Kane fears that the renewed investigation into Clinton’s emails will energise her critics.

“I’m concerned this will mobilise Trump supporters. Now, they have something new to be angry about.”

Clinton was also eager to change the conversation. Speaking in Sanford, she sought to shift questions of judgment and character away from her own campaign and focus instead on Trump. She questioned why he has still not released decades of tax returns, as she insists is customary for presidential candidates. She called his business practices to pay as little tax as possible “dubious”.

Clinton told her supporters Trump’s efforts to pay as little federal tax as possible has hurt Americans she believes need the most support, such as those in the military and also those in need of better education.

“He took everything our country has to offer and scooped it up with both hands,” she said.

But, even as the Clinton campaign attempted to shift the spotlight off their candidate and on to Trump, some of her supporters said that they don’t believe the latest development in the ongoing Clinton email controversy will hurt turnout for Clinton on Election Day.

“People have already made up their minds,” said Puyana.

Kane added that he was not worried. “The polls are all over the place. They favour a different candidate every week.”

And, he hopes come Election Day on Tuesday, they will still favour his candidate of choice – Hillary Clinton.