DETROIT—Recalling what she described as a tough but formative upbringing, presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand reportedly attempted to win over the audience at Wednesday night’s debate in Detroit by recounting the challenges she faced growing up as a 1966 Ford Country Squire. “I was raised on potholed streets, and my parents struggled, sometimes having to choose between whether to put gas in our tanks or feed the meter so we had a place to park at night,” said the New York senator, her voice tinged with emotion as she related how her father, a four-door domestic sedan with only 100,000 miles, fell behind on his repair bills, failed inspection, and was ultimately towed away to a junkyard. “No family of vehicles should ever have to make a choice like that, and when I’m president, I will fight to ensure no one has to. I’ll never forget where I came from.” Sources confirmed Gillibrand was later greeted with silence when she asked who else on the stage that night could claim to have been built by union labor “right here in the great state of Michigan.”