President Clinton has been touting his wife's commitment to Africa on the campaign trail by telling interested voters that "Hillary was the first U.S. Senator to call Darfur genocide." He used that exact line with voters in Aiken, S.C., yesterday, and it has been pointed out more than once over the course of this campaign.
The usually shy Chelsea also touted her mother's record on Darfur, telling a group at Stanford University earlier this month that she was "really proud that my mom was the first Democratic senator to call it genocide in May of 2004 and put a lot of pressure on the Bush administration to recognize it as genocide."
Problem is, the statements simply aren't true.
The first to call it genocide were actually Feingold (who mentioned the word in a committee hearing), DeWine (who first said it on the floor) and Brownback (who first wrote it into legislation). Three strikes, Hill.