Bill Clinton, on a campaign swing through California as the heat rises on his wife’s campaign , had this message to Democratic primary voters Monday: “Just relax.”  

For the first time, national polls show Hillary Clinton has lost her edge and might even be falling behind presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump. At the same time, Clinton has been forced to divide her attention with the never-ending primary battle against progressive socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders. But never mind all that , Bill Clinton said, according to local media reports.  

Once the primary is over, Hillary will be able to start fresh, he said.  

“You get to scrape the windshield clean,” he said at a rally in Stockton, according to the Sacramento Bee.  

Bill Clinton is making several campaign stops in California’s Central Valley ahead of the state’s June 7 primary, one of the last big contests before July’s Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. Meanwhile, Sanders, who has run an unrelenting campaign in the Golden State, rallied supporters in Los Angeles and Santa Monica.  

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Sanders Supporters Sue over California Primary

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The former president spent much of his speech addressing his wife’s international and domestic policy experience. The strategy serves the dual purpose of responding to Sanders’ claim that he is the better candidate to oppose Trump and positioning Hillary Clinton — a former secretary of state and U.S. senator — to take on that task herself.  

“Send her into that convention with the wind at her back,” the newspaper reported him saying.  

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Poll: Trump Starts With More than a Puncher’s Chance

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Meanwhile, a report averaging national polls presented an opposing viewpoint. On Sunday, the polling data site RealClearPolitics reported that national polls on a general election matchup between the Clinton and Trump show that Trump is on average 0.2 percentage points ahead of Clinton .  

RCP’s polling average had Clinton up 7.3 points over Trump on May 1.  

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Polls Show Trump, Clinton Close

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Many polling experts say its too early to trust the results of such surveys because voters aren’t paying as much attention as they will after the summer, and because Trump’s campaign defies conventional models.  

But Sean Trende, a senior analyst at RealClearPolitics, tweeted a different interpretation .

So it’s probably time to panic.

— Sean T at RCP (@SeanTrende) May 22, 2016

Contact Akin at stephanieakin@rollcall.com and follow her on Twitter at @stephanieakin
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