The “Who is running in 2020?” tea leaves thread

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Martin O'Malley campaigning in an IA Sen special election. Dear Lord, I commend him on his devotion to the grassroots but dude can't take a hint.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Brown's giving a speech tomorrow in Columbus, attacking Trump and outlining some legislative proposals.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/johnstanton/senate-democrat-to-outline-populist-economic-agenda-to-count?utm_term=.kog55lJz9v&bftw=pol#.mv5llwdxQn

Interesting.  According to Brown's Twitter feed, his speech will air on Facebook Live at around ~10:30am or so:

https://www.facebook.com/SenatorSherrodBrown/

It's really the first sign from Brown that he's interested, right?

As far as I can tell, yes.

Couldn't this just be part of his reelection to the Senate?

Could be, sure.  I guess the way the article is phrased "will call on Democrats...[etc., etc.]" and the focus on Trump make it sound like he's aiming for a national audience, but I don't know.  I guess it's just a question of, if you're a Democratic Senator in a swing or lean R state who's running for reelection, and with no presidential ambitions, how much do you focus on the big picture, trying to steer the direction of Democrats nationwide, vs. how much do you focus on parochial issues?  I guess if Brown is doing more of the former, then that's *something*.  But yeah, it's not like he's calling up activists in Iowa or anything like that.

Yeah, and given that developing a national profile (cf: Warren, Paul, Cruz last couple of Congresses) is a very good way to grassroots fundraise, this could just be Brown adjusting to the way the Senate is beginning to work nowadays.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

I don't know if this has been mentioned on the thread, but Elizabeth Warren is going on a book tour.

My girlfriend and I have tickets to the Chicago leg on April 22; I'll report back if there are any 2020 tea leaves.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

I don't know if this has been mentioned on the thread, but Elizabeth Warren is going on a book tour.

You linked to the info about her last book.  Her new book is "This Fight is Our Fight".  And yes, it's been mentioned here in this thread.  E.g.:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=233345.msg5513570#msg5513570

However, I haven't made any systematic attempt to list every stop she has planned on her book tour.  Is there a list somewhere?  I'm definitely keeping my eye out for any trips she might make to early primary states on this tour, if any.

A quick search on the event site reveals only one other event, occurring at a venue of a similar size in Boston. It looks like Senate fundraising, for all intents and purposes.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Hey Mr. Modern, I just wanted to give a public shout-out to how awesome it is that you spend your time finding and posting all these articles. I wouldn't be nearly as up to date on what is going on in the political world if it wasn't for you and the other awesome posters on this and other threads on the Atlas.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Bill Maher brought up a possible presidential run with Sheldon Whitehouse, who shut it down pretty quickly.

He also keeps pushing Gavin whom I like but even against Trump woukd look bad as only being governor for like a year before running

I refuse to believe that looks bad anymore. We have a reality tv star as president for christ sake.

Reality TV star is one thing. A snollygoster is quite another.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

At the Warren event in Chicago today. Very conspicuously a 2018 fundraiser and nothing more; limited staff visibility, no data capture of attendees, etc.

That said, the organist of the old-timey theater in which it's being held was playing the score of "Oklahoma!" So maybe she's trying to get back in touch with her middle America roots

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Moulton "looking at it" per his team.

Ew.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Warren continues crapping on Obama.

Trying to ingratiate herself with the Sanders wing that she """""betrayed""""" by endorsing the party's nominee in 2016.

Also bringing up legitimate grievances with President Obama's legitimate lack of leadership on these issues but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Warren continues crapping on Obama.

Trying to ingratiate herself with the Sanders wing that she """""betrayed""""" by endorsing the party's nominee in 2016.

Also bringing up legitimate grievances with President Obama's legitimate lack of leadership on these issues but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Huh? Obama has already hinted that he wants to get rid of gerrymandering, improve civic participation, and to get money out of politics.

He's already made great strides.

But he took Cantor Fitzgerald's money which means he is evil and part of the cabal that is ruining our democracy despite his actions that prove otherwise

Seriously, I maintain that Cantor Fitzgerald wanted to talk to the guy who killed Bin Laden considering the entire firm was nearly taken out on 9/11 and that Obama should get paid for spending his valuable time speaking with them.

Is that gonna be the go to excuse now every time one of these politicians cozies up to Wall Street? Hillary Clinton made the 9/11 argument last year to justify taking money from Wall Street as well. This is getting absurd.

We're gonna get our asses handed to us again in 2018 and 2020 until Democrats stop being the soft Party of the rich.

Well, as we learned in the 2nd debate HRC's relationship to Wall St. is okay because she represented them on 9/11, so why not? 9/11 is why Dems are pro corporate and you're a Russian if you disagree XD

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Booker already has a video out on the Comey firing:

https://twitter.com/CoryBooker/status/862070508141129728

I misread this as "a book out on the Comey firing."

I think I need to take a break and Presidential books need to stop being a thing.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Kasich+Martin O'Malley are the most blatantly obvious candidate we've had in a long time.

FTFY

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

I think one of the biggest things muddying the waters re: 2020 Tea Leaves is the complex interrelationship between publicity and power in DC.

Fundamentally, people who want power in Washington need to make the same set of moves that people need to make to set up a Presidential run. Bob Corker isn't going to run for President, but the more he can set himself up as an anti-Trump guy from a safe Senate seat, the better for his influence in the Senate. Bernie Sanders is not going to run again, but because he's been granted essential carte blanche to blast his message across CNN and MSNBC and show up on all the Sunday talk shows he wants, he sees an opportunity to press his agenda and make his case for the Democratic party of the future.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Loyalists & establishmentarians peeved at Sanders for being murky on his plans.

I think that this is actually a classic example of what I stated back on the last page. I think it's abundantly clear from the article that, unless no other prog populist stands up, Bernie isn't running. But he wants to define the Democratic identity, so he appears in public, builds his list, is generally not a quiet, get a long to go along legislator.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Interesting tidbit from a podcast earlier this month:What if Cory Booker actually isn't running for President??

Here's an interview from Sen. Booker on Pod Save the People from 5.2.17, where he gives a pretty forceful (but not Shermanesque) denial to a very straight forward question on presidential ambitions.


Here's the full quote:

Deray McKesson: First question, I have a lot of things to ask you, but I will start with the simple one first. Are you going to run for President?

Cory Booker: Uh, no that's not my plan. And I frankly think that anyone who is saying that they are running for President is suspect right now. That is three plus years away...... I think that it's just foolish to be focused on something like that right now.

That's pretty much the opposite of a strong denial.

Pay attention to how he's putting off the decision by saying that it's too far away and talking about where his 'focus' is. Time elapses and public facing 'focuses' are likely to change.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

FWIW, Booker's gonna have to presumably make a hard choice sometime in 2019 between keeping his safe Senate seat and running for President. He could pull a Rubio and do both, but the Democratic bench in New Jersey is deep and he's already taken bruises from a primary once. So I don't think it's out of the question that he genuinely is "unsure" if he wants to run yet or not.

This is why I'm skeptical of the idea that JBE or even Franken will run.

Booker is also only 48. I wonder if we're crowding the 2020 stable with prospects who are perhaps thinking more about 2024 or 2028 (Booker, Harris, Kander all spring readily to mind).

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

FWIW, Booker's gonna have to presumably make a hard choice sometime in 2019 between keeping his safe Senate seat and running for President. He could pull a Rubio and do both, but the Democratic bench in New Jersey is deep and he's already taken bruises from a primary once. So I don't think it's out of the question that he genuinely is "unsure" if he wants to run yet or not.

This is why I'm skeptical of the idea that JBE or even Franken will run.

Booker is also only 48. I wonder if we're crowding the 2020 stable with prospects who are perhaps thinking more about 2024 or 2028 (Booker, Harris, Kander all spring readily to mind).

That's what people were saying four years ago about folks like Cruz and Rubio.

It's too early to say that anyone is a lock to run.  There's legitimate uncertainty about the potential candidates' intentions.  But let's not talk ourselves into ignoring the clear signals that candidates tend to give about their presidential ambitions.  Booker (to pick one example) meeting with both the Iowa and New Hampshire delegations at least year's DNC was a clear signal of presidential ambition, and *usually* candidates with such presidential ambition don't wait around that long before making a presidential run.

So is he a lock to run?  No.  But he's *way* more likely to run than the dozens of Democratic senators who don't do things like that.  And looking at signals like that (meeting with politicos from the early primary states) is usually a better predictor of who will run than our armchair assessments of when is the right time for a given candidate to make their move to the presidential arena.

Oh no that's definitely true - I was merely hedging based on the fact that the younger folks might see that they've got multiple times to run, and how much of a disaster the clown car was this time around.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Senator Warren was on Obama legacy podcast Pod Save America today.

The podcast is quickly shaping up to be a 2020 cattle-call, featuring Cory Booker, Warren, Mayor Eric Garcetti, Senator Klobuchar, and other rumored candidates over the past couple months.

But again, this could just be people trying to be on the national Democratic stage without running for President.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

So, yeah, Clinton is not running again.

Kaitlan Collins‏ @kaitlancollins
Clinton is asked why she did Goldman Sachs speeches.
HC: "Why do you have Goldman Sachs here?"
Recode: "They paid us."
HC: "They paid me."

I love that.

It's refreshing honesty, but doesn't diminish any of my concerns with the practice.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

AFAIK, O'Malley's PAC is also still operating.

You appear to be right. The last report from the committee showed that it ended calendar year 2016 with 23k cash on hand. They haven't filed any reports since.

The non-federal PAC terminated itself in Sept 2016 though.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Update on John Kerry, who two weeks ago said that he wasn’t “ruling anything in or out":

https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/03/01/john-kerry-lands-another-post-government-gig-visiting-distinguished-statesman-think-tank/JeAVT7OVhmb5QlfXQmrWBP/story.html

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And, further follow up on this: This news is several weeks old now, but apparently at a private event last month.....

http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/03/politics/john-kerry-future/index.html

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I hope, I hope, I HOPE, that this means that he's open to another term as Sec State in the next Dem administration.

Though yet again. As a shameless hack for the Prog Populists, I hope all of these centrist has beens run, and I hope only one of ours runs. We'll have it wrapped up by Super Tuesday.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

The Bernie wing seems to love Tulsi Gabbard for certain positions when she's one of the most conservative Dems in the House/Senate. Don't expect them to pick any better come 2020 unless it's Bernie who runs.

As a card carrying member of the Bernie wing, I wouldn't bet on Gabbard holding our standard. Look for Warren or Perriello (if he wins his primary in 12 days!)

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Article on CNN regarding Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley

http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/11/politics/jeff-merkley-2020-plans-president/index.html

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Don't quotes like this seem to indicate that Warren is not planning to run? Merkley and Warren are colleagues and factional allies, and Merkley doesn't strike me as an egomaniac. If he knew she were running he would A) know what's better for the progressive cause and B ) know his chances running against her.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

"major role" sounds a lot more like endorsing than running to me.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

Merkley does not rule out running for prez:

https://kobi5.com/news/senator-merkley-addresses-rumors-of-presidential-bid-55607/

I'm hyperventilating.

I just... really don't see it. And I say this as one of the resident torch waving Berniecrats on the board.