Holton tells campaign volunteers they ‘cut through the noise’

CEDAR RAPIDS — On her first campaign trip to Iowa, Anne Holton met with Hillary for Iowa volunteers in Cedar Rapids, joining them to make calls urging people to register to vote and remind them that early voting starts in just 10 days.

'I'm all in for Hillary,' said the wife of Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia.

Holton encouraged the volunteers to maintain their effort for the last 50 days of the campaign because, in a year when many voters are already growing weary of the campaign, they'll play an important role.

Her husband — 'my best political adviser,' Holton said — told her 'in this day and age of so much noise in the news, the ads, the talking heads, people are really tuning that out.'

'But what they don't tune out is the one-to-one contact,' Holton told about 50 people at the Democratic field office at 2706 First Ave. NE. 'When you call even a stranger and say you are a volunteer calling for Hillary Clinton ... that makes a difference. That cuts through all this noise.'

Holton, a lawyer and former juvenile and family court judge for 17 years, served as Virginia's secretary of education for two years until Kaine received the vice presidential nomination. Earlier in the day she campaigned with her husband at Iowa State University and later, on her own at the University of Northern Iowa, she had a round-table discussion with students and educators about Clinton's plan to make college debt-free.

Kaine and Holton, the second woman in American history whose father and husband both served as governor, have been married 37 years and have three adult children.

Without specifically referring to polls that show Republican Donald Trump gaining on Clinton in Iowa — leading in some cases — Holton reminded the volunteers that the 2016 election is a close race.

'Every minute, every day counts,' she said. 'Use all 50 days.'