- Hillary Clinton has key ties to four states: Illinois, Arkansas, New York and Pennsylvania
- Clinton herself has not publicly shied away from citizenship in any of these states
- Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said Clinton "will forever be a Chicagoan at heart."
- Tom Wolf, Pennsylvania's governor elect, said her blood has "Pennsylvania values"
Washington (CNN) -- Hillary Clinton is a New Yorker. And an Arkansan. And an Illinoisan. And at times also even a Pennsylvanian.
While the question -- Where is Hillary Clinton from? -- may seem simple, the answer was made harder as Clinton traveled the country over the last six months stumping for Democratic candidates during the midterms and peddling her memoir. People from at least four states like to lay claim to Clinton, and the former secretary of state never shied away from those signs of citizenship.
Born in Park Ridge, Illinois in 1947, Clinton rose to prominence during her 20-year stay in Arkansas from 1974 to 1992. After living in Washington, D.C., for eight years as first lady, Clinton moved to Chappaqua, New York and represented the Empire State for eight years in the Senate.
Geographical identity politics are a core part of the American campaign trail from local offices all the way up Pennsylvania Avenue -- just ask Dick Lugar or Scott Brown -- and having home roots that are considered authentic by voters is a key part of messaging for any presidential hopeful, and that includes Clinton.
At times, she plays up her Arkansas roots and slight southern accent. In other forums, she is the former senator from New York and resident of Chappaqua. And when she is anywhere in the Midwest, Clinton is the Chicago Cubs-loving child from Park Ridge, Illinois.
The Clintons currently maintain their primary residence in New York and another home in Washington, D.C.
Clinton's returning to one of these "home" states this weekend -- Arkansas -- for a 10th anniversary celebration of the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock.
Here is how Clinton is linked to four states -- Illinois, Arkansas, New York and Pennsylvania -- and why it matters.
Illinois:
In Chicago, Clinton is heralded as a native daughter.
Giving her an introduction at an October event in Chicago, Lester Knight said he was "welcoming her home." Mayor Rahm Emanuel said in June that Clinton "still and will forever be a Chicagoan at heart."
Clinton spent her first eighteen years of life in Park Ridge, Illinois, a middle class neighborhood a few miles from downtown.
Clinton, however, left the state in 1965 to attend Wellesley College in Massachusetts and since then has not lived in Illinois for any considerable time.
Clinton maintains a small group of Park Ridge friends to this day. When she visited the city in June, she had a small dinner with many of them and reminisced about their years in at school and in their Methodist church group.
Hillary Clinton, on her relationship to Chicago
"It is always great to be back in Chicago," Clinton said in October. "This is where I was born, where I grew up. Where I made so many life long friends and it is wonderful to be part of an extended community such as Chicago represents."
Arkansas:
More than any other state, the Clinton family is most closely associated with Arkansas.
Hillary Clinton moved to Fayetteville, Arkansas in 1974 to marry Bill Clinton, a native son of the state and rising political star. For the next 18 years, the Clintons came to dominate the state's political scene. Bill Clinton served one term as Attorney General before serving five terms as governor.
Hillary Clinton was a high profile first lady in the state, but Arkansas was never really home for her. Even her closest friends acknowledge that Hillary was never in love with Arkansas and was at times put off by how women were viewed.
Hillary Clinton does, however, occasionally returns to the state, as she did when she spoke at two Little Rock events in July. And longtime Democrats in the state still lay claim to the former first lady.
Adrienne Elrod, a former Clinton aide from Arkansas
"Hillary Clinton's roots in Arkansas run deep, and many Arkansans still consider her their hometown girl," said Adrienne Elrod, a former Clinton aide from Arkansas. "As a native Arkansan, I could not be more proud to call her one of us."
New York:
When Hillary Clinton decided to run for Senate in 2000, she had no connection to New York. And Republicans knew it was a weakness.
"Name me three things Hillary Clinton has ever done for the people of New York," Sean Hannity, then a New York radio host, proclaimed regularly during his show at the time.
Aware of the challenges, Clinton traveled the state on a "listening tour" and talked with voters in schools, labor halls and community buildings. She also established residency in the Empire State by moving to Chappaqua, the small hamlet that the Clintons still consider home today.
"I think I have some real work to do, to get out and listen and learn from the people of New York and demonstrate that what I'm for is maybe as important, if not more important, than where I'm from," Clinton told the New York Times in 1999.
Clinton even played up her sporting allegiances to become closer to New York.
"I am Cubs fan," she told an audience in Chicago before noting that because she "couldn't stay hitched with a losing team" she "became a Yankees fan."
Clinton's supporters argue she was a Yankees fan as a child and photos from 1992 published in her 2003 memoir "Living History" show the first lady in a New York hat.
"I'm wearing the hat of my lifelong favorite American League team," says the description under the photo.
Today, Clinton identifies most with New York. She lives there, votes there and her office is in Manhattan.
Pennsylvania:
Of the states that have laid claim to Clinton, Pennsylvania is the most random.
Clinton's father -- Hugh Rodham -- was born in Scranton, a city in the Northeast corner of the state. The Rodham family has deep ties to the region and even after moving to Chicago, Hillary and her family would spend summers at a rustic cabin on Lake Winola on the city's outskirts. (If Scranton sounds familiar, that's because it's also from where another potential 2016 Democratic hopeful Vice President Joe Biden.)
"The rustic cabin had no heat except for the cast-iron cook stove in the kitchen, and no indoor bath or shower," Clinton wrote in her memoir "Living History." "To stay clean, we swam in the lake or stood below the back porch while someone poured a tub of water onto our heads."
So when Clinton campaigned for Pennsylvania Democrats in 2014, many used those roots to tie her with the state.
Tom Wolf, governor-elect of Pennsylvania
Tom Wolf, the governor-elect of the state, said, "coursing through [Hillary Clinton's] veins is blood that's tinged with Pennsylvania values and Pennsylvania ideas."
At the event, Clinton also played up those roots and talked about her father's side of the family, their interest in politics and her time on the lake.
"I spent every summer of my growing up years traveling on the turnpike going up to Scranton and often times during Christmas coming back," Clinton said. "The state has been very good to my family and to my husband and to me."
Clinton's ties to the state also came in handy when Clinton ran for president in 2008. Because Clinton was able to better identify with the hard scrabble, predominately white Democrats of central and North East Pennsylvania, she won the state's primary.
"She's tough," Christopher Doherty, Scranton's mayor at the time told the New York Times. "That's a real Scranton trait."
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