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hillary clinton began conducting focus groups and polling swing state voters as early as december 2014 to figure out how to brand herself and find a <u+201c>rationale<u+201d> for running for president. 




nearly two years before the election, clinton<u+2019>s team circulated a timeline of research objectives for which the nascent campaign would spend $2 million on focus groups and surveys, according to recently released hacked emails. 




a <u+201c>fundamental question<u+201d> was how to brand hillary as either <u+201c>badass/hip,<u+201d> or a <u+201c>grandma.<u+201d> 




<u+201c>attached is an updated summary of the research process and a budget,<u+201d> robby mook, who would become clinton<u+2019>s campaign manager, emailed on dec. 8, 2014. <u+201c>i want to emphasize that this *will* change because the team will have better ideas on methodology and the strategy will evolve as the project progresses.<u+201d> 




<u+201c>i would still assume our budget will be in the $2+ million range per my earlier memo, even though the attached budget is lower than $2 million (obviously, we are going to make this as cheap as we can without sacrificing thoroughness and quality),<u+201d> he said.
clinton held focus groups for 2 years before election to find a <u+2018>rationale<u+2019> for running for president
howard portnoy