HANKS FLOATED FOR VP
Oprah Winfrey-Tom Hanks 2020; Seth Meyers is 2018 hosting litmus test
Oprah Winfrey’s impassioned call for “a brighter morning even in our darkest nights” at the Golden Globes has Democratic Party activists buzzing about the media superstar and the 2020 presidential race—even if it’s only a fantasy.
Even so, for Democrats in early voting states, and perhaps for a public that largely disapproves of President Donald Trump’s job performance, the notion of a popular media figure as a presidential candidate is not as strange as it once seemed, given the New York real estate mogul and reality TV star now in the White House.
“Look, it’s ridiculous—and I get that,” said Brad Anderson, Barack Obama’s 2012 Iowa campaign director. While he supports the idea of Winfrey running, it would also punctuate how Trump’s candidacy has altered political norms. “At the same time, politics is ridiculous right now.”
Winfrey’s speech as she accepted the Cecil B. DeMille lifetime achievement award on Sunday exhorted the legions of women who have called out sexual harassers—and her dream of a day “when nobody has to say ‘me too’ again.” It got some political operatives, in early voting states such as Iowa and New Hampshire, thinking Winfrey might be just what the Democrats need.
Winfrey, in September and October, publicly dismissed the notion of seeking the nation’s highest office. But her longtime partner, Stedman Graham, told the Los Angeles Times: “She would absolutely do it.”
NBC tweeted a picture of a smiling Winfrey under the message, “Nothing but respect for our future president. #goldenglobes.” It quickly attracted attention, including Donald Trump Jr.’s. The president’s son retweeted it, calling it “strange.”
The network later deleted the tweet and explained that it was done by a “third party agency” and was a reference to a joke by Golden Globes host Seth Meyers.
The “Late Night” host implied that he made President Trump run for president when he hosted the 2011 White House Correspondents Dinner, and he was hoping he could do it again with Oprah. He joked during his opening monologue: “In 2011, I told some jokes about our current president at the White House Correspondents Dinner, jokes about how he was unqualified to be president.”
“And some have said that night convinced him to run. And if that’s true, I would just like to say Oprah you will never be President... You do not have what it takes.”
And who would Winfrey’s runningmate be?
“And (Tom) Hanks... where’s Hanks? You will never be vice president. You are too mean and unrelatable.”
#OprahForPresident trended on Twitter.
As the host of the Oscars in two months, Jimmy Kimmel watched Meyers and felt that one of the monologue jokes was written specifically for him.
“I do thank him for being that litmus test,” Kimmel said. The topic (sexual harassment in Hollywood) will surely be talked about on the Oscars, but he can’t write material in advance because it’s hard to predict
what the public mood will be, or if other news breaks in the interim. “Who’s to say Harvey Weinstein is going to be alive in two months?” Kimmel joked.