John Edwards returns to native state

By: Mackenzie Taylor/WBTW News13 | SCNow
Published: November 02, 2007

CHERAW — Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards returned to his native state of South Carolina on Friday morning for a two-day campaign swing.

Edwards’s first stop was in Cheraw, where he held a Town Hall meeting on the Town Green. About 200 people showed up for the event, despite the breezy, chilly weather.

Edwards spoke to voters about many issues, including his plan to provide universal health-care coverage for every person in America.

According to Edwards’s Web site, there are about 45 million people without insurance in the United States.

Edwards also talked about some of the issues he plans to focus on during the next few months leading up to the presidential primaries, including job creation in rural America.

“…Creating jobs in small towns and small communities, ensuring that we help family farmers to be able to earn a decent living, making sure that we build out broadband, high-speed Internet into all the areas of rural America,” Edwards said. “I mean, basically, I come from this place. I understand what’s happening here and, as president, I intend to do everything I can to strengthen rural America.”

Edwards assured voters the Pee Dee is important to his campaign.

He said some of the struggles happening in this part of the state are representative of struggles happening elsewhere across the country.

“Having grown up in the South, having grown up in a mill town, mill towns, across the South, including here in South Carolina, I mean, I can see what’s happened here and I have very specific ideas about what we can do to strengthen these areas,” Edwards said.

Residents from across the Pee Dee gathered in Cheraw to hear Edwards speak.

“I was very impressed with John. I think he’s very charismatic, he’s very personable, and I think he had a great connect with the people in this town,” Charlie Rose, a resident of Cheraw, said. “He talked about drugs, which is certainly a big concern of ours. He talked about the war in Iraq. My wife and I have a son that’s in (his) second tour of the Marines in Iraq right now. So we’re very, very concerned about him.”

Edwards also made stops in Lancaster and Rock Hill on Friday. His campaign swing continues today with a stop in Columbia at a fundraiser.

John Edwards returns to native state

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