WASHINGTON (AFP) — US Senator Hillary Clinton will return to congressional politics this week before staging her first joint appearances with White House contender Barack Obama, a spokesman said Sunday.
Clinton's Senate spokesman Philippe Reines said the New York senator would be in the chamber on Tuesday and Wednesday for the first time since losing to Obama in the Democratic presidential nominating race nearly three weeks ago.
In her first public speech since conceding, Clinton told a high-school graduating class in New York on Sunday that meeting thousands of people across the nation during her primary campaign had been an "extraordinary experience."
"No one four years ago could have predicted that an African-American and a woman would have been competing for the presidency of the United States in 2008," she said in a clip aired by NY1 television.
Clinton urged the graduating class, which included a longtime volunteer to her campaign, to use their "God-given talents and abilities" not only for themselves "but for all of us to make this world a better place."
Reines confirmed also that Clinton would address the National Association of Latino Elected Officials in Washington Thursday. Hispanic voters formed one of the former first lady's strongest blocs of support against Obama.
Later Thursday Clinton and Obama are to appear together at a private event to raise funds for the Illinois senator's White House bid, Reines said, before appearing together in public Friday for the first time since Obama's victory.
Details of Friday's event are still awaited from the Obama campaign.
Clinton vowed to throw her full support behind the Democrats' new standard-bearer when she stepped out of the race on June 7, ending her 17-month-long quest to become the nation's first woman president.
The former rivals met privately at the Washington home of a fellow senator three days after Obama secured the Democratic nod on June 3, but Clinton has kept a low profile since the end of their historic nomination race.
Her husband, former president Bill Clinton, also returned to public life Sunday with a speech on climate change and energy efficiency to the United States Conference of Mayors in Miami.
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