Sen. Bernie Sanders reportedly told Sen. Elizabeth Warren in her Washington, D.C., apartment in December 2018 that he did not believe a woman could win the United States presidential race, according to CNN. His comment allegedly came after Warren (D-MA) told Sanders (I-VT) that she could spearhead economic policy and earn mounting support from female voters. The two Democratic candidates were reportedly having a conversation about the implications of running against each other as Democratic candidates. They allegedly agreed that if they ultimately became opponents, they should remain civil to maintain the integrity of the progressive movement.

Warren, who is now the lone female candidate at the top of the Democratic field, told Sanders that she disagreed with his assertion that a woman could not win, according to three sources familiar with the meeting. “It is ludicrous to believe that at the same meeting where Elizabeth Warren told me she was going to run for president, I would tell her that a woman could’'t win,” Sanders told CNN in response to the characterization of the meeting.