LJUBLJANA, Slovenia — First lady Laura Bush made an unusual foray into the U.S. presidential campaign Monday, praising Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., for her “grit and strength” and coming to the defense of Michelle Obama.
Bush, who joined her husband in Slovenia, told ABC News that she would prefer for the first female president “to be a Republican woman” but added: “I will say I watched the campaign and admired Hillary’s grit and strength.”
The first lady also suggested that Barack Obama’s wife probably did not intend to say, as she did in February, that she was proud of her country for “the first time” in her adult life because her husband’s candidacy showed that voters were eager for change.
“I think she probably meant ‘I’m more proud . . .,’ ” Bush said. “You have to be really careful in what you say, because everything you say is looked at and, in many cases, misconstrued.”
