Elizabeth Warren: I’ll ‘Take a Hard Look’ at Running for President After Midterms
The Massachusetts senator had previously more forcefully ruled it out.
Yuri Gripas/Reuters
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), one of the most high-profile progressives on the U.S. Senate, said Saturday that she will seriously consider a presidential run after November’s midterm elections.
“Let’s face it, Donald Trump is taking this country in the wrong direction,” Warren told an audience member at a town hall in Holyoke, Massachusetts, according to remarks sent to The Daily Beast by a spokesperson.
“Working people have taken one punch to the gut after another,” she continued. “And I am worried down to my bones about what Donald Trump is doing to our democracy.”
Warren told the group that Washington was broken long before Donald Trump came to town but added that it has “gotten a whole lot worse,” going on to express her outrage at hearings Thursday over sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
“And then this week, I watched 11 men who were too chicken to ask a woman a single question,” she added. “I watched as Brett Kavanaugh acted like he was entitled to that position and angry at anyone who would question him. I watched powerful men helping a powerful man make it to an even more powerful position.”
“I watched that and I thought time’s up. Time’s up,” she said. “It’s time for women to go to Washington and fix our broken government and that includes a woman at the top. So here’s what I promise, after November 6, I will take a hard look at running for president.”
Prior to Saturday, the Massachusetts Democrat had responded to such questions by saying she was primarily focused on her reelection bid, in which she is expected to win easily. But she has also criss-crossed the country to assist in Democratic efforts to take back the House of Representatives and the Senate, also sending fundraising emails for some of these candidates.
Should she choose to enter what will likely be a crowded 2020 Democratic field, Warren would conceivably leap into frontrunner status alongside other rumored names such as former Vice President Joe Biden and Warren’s colleague Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT).