ANDERSON, Ind. (AP) — Hillary Rodham Clinton tried to persuade Hoosier voters Thursday that her policies could help boost a lagging economy if she were president.

Clinton talked during a visit to a Terre Haute diner and then told a crowd of about 5,000 people in hard-hit Anderson about taking steps she said would protect American jobs such as rewriting trade agreements and ending tax breaks for corporations that send jobs out of the country.

Clinton's toughest language drew the loudest applause from the crowd that filled more than half of the Anderson High School gym.

"We're going to say to the people who run American businesses, isn't it time to put America first again?" she said.

Vicki Chase, a biology teacher at Highland High School in Anderson who came as a Clinton backer, thought that the senator's speech would get her more support from local voters in her race against Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination.

"I think her stance on NAFTA got the attention of this crowd," she said. "That will get her votes here in Anderson."

Anderson has been one of the country's most dramatic examples of the decline of traditional Rust Belt manufacturing. The automotive industry once employed about 27,000 people in the city, but the last of those jobs left last summer when Delphi Corp. halted production at its factory.

Despite efforts to attract new employers, the area's unemployment rate of 6.8 percent for January remained well above the statewide rate of 4.5 percent. It was strong support for Clinton in similar blue-collar areas of Ohio that helped her defeat Obama in that state's March 4 primary.

Clinton's trips to Terre Haute and Anderson fit with a strategy to build support in areas that have been hit with job losses. She also spoke at a rally Thursday night in Evansville to cap her first campaign swing through Indiana leading up to the May 6 primary.

Clinton drew the biggest cheers in Anderson when she took aim at the high costs of gasoline, health care and college loans.

"If we don't take back the White House, I'll guarantee you that in four years, eight years, 12 years, we'll still be complaining about the same things," she said.

Jim Janes, a 70-year-old who works for the Madison County Highway Department, recalled hearing Robert Kennedy speak in the same Anderson gym during his 1968 presidential campaign. He said he was surprised that Indiana had become a key state again in the primary voting and came to Clinton's stop undecided between her and Obama.

"The number one issue here is jobs, because we've lost so many industries over the years," Janes said. "We need to stop the jobs from going overseas."

Hundreds of people greeted Clinton earlier as she arrived at the Saratoga Bar and Cafe in Terre Haute, where she was cheered by dozens of supporters who packed into the restaurant.

She and Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh, who endorsed her months ago, sat at a table with a half dozen workers for a roundtable discussion that centered on economic concerns. Terre Haute has also had bad news recently, with drug maker Pfizer Inc. announcing in January it would lay off 660 workers at its Vigo County plant by midyear.

Clinton said the country's middle class had suffered under President Bush, with the average Indiana family's income declining more than $2,000 since he took office.

"We're not standing up for people who work hard every single day, whether they're making cars or making pharmaceuticals or they're making some other product here," Clinton said. "It's not the same world where we can just work harder and harder and harder and get ahead. We have to be smarter and our government has to be a partner with our companies and our workers."

Clinton repeated her theme of standing up for the middle class before a cheering crowd at Harrison High School in Evansville Thursday night.

"Wall Street and big business, they've had a president for the last seven years," she said. "I think it's time you had a president again."

Clinton's trip follows a trip to Plainfield Saturday by Obama and two days after her husband, former President Bill Clinton, visited three Indiana cities on her behalf.