Democrat leader Hillary Clinton on Sunday issued a disagreeing statement about US President Barack Obama’s trade agenda.

Hillary told a campaign rally in Des Moines, Iowa that the US president must listen to and work with his allies in Congress, starting with Nancy Pelosi, a minority leader of US who prevented the president from obtaining trade promotional authority last week.

But Wednesday night, Bill Clinton muddied his wife’s message and deflated the hopes of some on the left by touting the benefits of trade deals in an appearance on ‘The Daily Show’.

The former president said, “On balance, the countries that we have trade agreements with, we tend to have a balance of trade, much more than, let’s say with China”.

The two statements by Clintons were seen by labor leaders as part of a tag-team approach in which the Clintons get to have it both ways.

After Hillary toggled to the left to appease labor unions, the labor leaders said, Bill Clinton’s television appearance looked like an attempt to assuage the corporate elites.

Larry Cohen, who stepped down last week as president of the Communications Workers of America, said it was quite difficult not to view Bill Clinton as a surrogate for his wife.

Cohen, who is also the leader of a broad labor coalition opposing Obama’s trade agenda said in a statement that people will obviously infer, as they did in 2008, from his comments some reflection on his wife’s campaign.

Some others considered it more as an example of how Hillary Clinton has to deal with her husband’s legacy as she builds her own.

Bill Clinton’s comments, on behalf of the Clinton Foundation, were aimed at defending his own presidential record, which includes the controversial North American Free Trade Act, they said.