Hillary Clinton campaigns in Culver City, Santa Ana, San Bernardino

LOS ANGELES, Calif. (FOX 11 / CNS) - Touting campaign themes such as preserving Obamacare, ensuring paid family leave and defending women's rights, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton used a Culver City rally today to urge supporters to get to the polls next week -- as her California race with Democratic opponent Bernie Sanders gets tighter.

Click to watch the Hillary Clinton organizing event on our FOX 11 Facebook page.

" ... We have to -- starting in the California primary on Tuesday -- send an unmistakable message we are stronger together, we are going to work together for a better and fairer nation," Clinton told a cheering crowd at a "Women for Hillary" event at West Los Angeles College.

"And that's why I need all of you to send in those ballots that are sitting on your kitchen counter," she said. "... If all goes well, I will have the great honor as of Tuesday to be the Democratic nominee for president."

Clinton again took aim at presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, calling him "unprepared" and "unfit to be president," and saying the nation cannot afford a Trump presidency.

"We have worked too hard for too long," she said. "We have come too far to let anybody turn us back now and we are going to stand our ground while we seek common ground to solve the problems that face our country, to bring
people to together across all the lines that divide us."

The appearance in Culver City, which was attended by a host of female elected officials and celebrities such as Elizabeth Banks and Sally Field, was the first of four Southern California events on Clinton's schedule for the day.

She will hold a 1:45 p.m. rally at the Westminster Rose Center, then take part in a conversation with "community leaders" at Crave restaurant, both in Santa Ana. At 6 p.m., Clinton will hold a rally at Cal State San Bernardino.

Former President Bill Clinton, meanwhile, is also in the area stumping on behalf of his wife's campaign, with rallies in Burbank, Pacoima, Woodland Hills and Santa Monica.

Clinton's rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, was campaigning in Northern California, speaking at rallies in Cloverdale and Fairfield and conducting what his campaign called a labor news conference in Berkeley with Robert Reich, a labor secretary during Bill Clinton's administration.

Presumptive Republican nominee Donald J. Trump will also be in Northern California, speaking at an early afternoon rally in Redding.

On Thursday, Hillary Clinton campaigned in San Diego, where she issued a five-point national security plan and said electing Trump would be a "historic mistake."

"I believe he will take our country down a truly dangerous path," Clinton said in a 35-minute speech in Balboa Park. Among other things, she said Trump picks fights with allies while praising dictators, and claims to know
more about the Islamic State than U.S. military leaders.

In contrast, her policies would be to make the United States strong at home, maintain ties with allied nations, use diplomacy to defuse problems before they grow, be firm with rival leaders and develop a "real plan" to
deal with terrorists, she said.

Trump responded on Twitter: "Crooked Hillary no longer has credibility - too much failure in office. People will not allow another four years of incompetence!" A later tweet criticized what he described as a poor performance reading from a teleprompter.

Speaking at a rally in San Jose Thursday night, Trump called Clinton's speech "sad to watch" and a "phony hit job."

"It was supposed to be a foreign policy speech; it was a political speech," Trump said. "It was a political speech. It had nothing to do with foreign policy."

Before Clinton delivered her speech Thursday, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus issued a statement criticizing her.

"There isn't a more flawed messenger on national security issues than Hillary Clinton, who as Obama's secretary of state helped turn Libya into a jihadist playground, spearheaded the dangerous nuclear deal with Iran and
secretly called for bringing terrorists from Guantanamo onto U.S. soil," he said.

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