Sanders, Warren, Gabbard, ALL Likely Contenders In The 2020 Presidential Election
In an interview with Fox News, Sen. Bernie Sanders states that his 2020 campaign for the presidency would be predicated upon the existence of grassroots support, saying that "If there is, I'll run". One need look no farther than the almost innumerable base of supporters, or the gigantic sums of campaign contributions infamously averaging $27 each to affirmatively state that there is indeed "grassroots support". A mere couple of days after the aforementioned appearance on Fox News, The New York Times revealed a meeting held between Sanders, and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, wherein both parties concurred that each were likely to pursue the Democratic nomination. This will no doubt cause a rift among progressives between the policy-minded Sanders-supporters who distinctly recall Warren's support for Hillary Clinton in Democratic Primary last time, and those who care slightly less abut policy, hoping instead for the symbolic political gesture of having the first female President. Warren annoyed some on the left when she decided recently to respond to Donald Trump's insults by releasing a DNA test proving herself to be fractionally Native American.
The 2 dueling Senators will not be alone, however, in attempting to curry the support of the nominal left in the upcoming democratic primaries. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D) of Hawaii is reportedly likewise amassing campaign staff, according to reporting by The Daily Beast, which claims staffers will be assembled after the New Year. Gabbard, who told MSNBC in an interview that she was "seriously considering" running, has her own base of avid supporters, and enjoys high approval ratings, and a status as "Hawaii's most popular politician".
It is unclear how progressives with tendencies to engage in incessant infighting, sectarian division, and anthropocentric political discourse would fair in a democratic primary involving all three politicians, albeit Sanders is likely to have the advantage considering an exponentially increased name recognition from his bid for the White House, where he rose from being an almost-unheard-of Independent Senator from Vermont to being America's most popular politician. This time, he does not begin as a lightweight political underdog, but rather, in the eyes of many, the objective front-runner. Although Sanders has been criticized by some for seemingly "propping up the Democratic Party", and regurgitating the Russiagate narrative, his recent successful push resulting in a vote on the Senate floor to withdraw American support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen rebukes other criticisms that he is "weak on foreign policy".