Democrats preparing for election in 2020
RENO, Nev. — During a campaign-style tour of the West late last month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren did not announce she was running for president. But in private events and public speeches, her message about 2020 was as clear as it was rousing.
In Salt Lake City, Warren urged Democrats to turn out in force for the midterm elections to build momentum for the next presidential race, and in Denver, she told a meeting of state legislators and trial lawyers that she wanted to be a tribune for lower-income Americans, according to people who attended the events. And in a speech to the Nevada Democratic Party in Reno, Warren said Democrats must do more than “drive Donald Trump and his enablers out of power.”
“I want a party strong enough to take on the hard job of cleaning up the mess they’ll leave behind once they are gone,” Warren declared, all but volunteering for the task.
Before the trip and since, Warren and her emissaries have been reaching out to key Democratic officeholders in Iowa, Nevada and South Carolina — three states early in the presidential primary calendar — making introductions and offering help in the midterm campaign. Altogether, her moves are among the most assertive steps taken by any Democrat to prepare for 2020.
Warren, 69, now leads a small advance guard of Democrats who appear to be moving deliberately toward challenging President Donald Trump. Former Vice President Joe Biden, wielding a political network cultivated over decades, has been reasserting himself as a party leader, while Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Kamala Harris of California have emerged as fresher-faced messengers for the midterms. And Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the runner-up in the 2016 primaries, has been acting like a candidate as he considers another race.
All five have been traveling the country, raising money for Democrats and gauging the appeal of their personalities and favorite themes. As a group, they are a strikingly heterogeneous array of rivals for Trump, embodying the Democratic Party’s options for defining itself: They are distinguished by gender and race, span three decades in age and traverse the ideological and tonal spectrum between combative Democratic socialism and consensusminded incrementalism.
Yet absent, at least so far, is either an obvious political phenom such as former President Barack Obama or an establishmentbacked juggernaut in the mold of Hillary Clinton. Unlike the last few Democratic primaries, the unsettled race evokes the sprawling nomination fights of earlier decades — lacking a dominant figure and seemingly inviting new leaders to rise.
“The opportunity for somebody to emerge and catch a wave hasn’t been this high since 1976,” said Anita Dunn, a veteran Democratic strategist, referring to another unpredictable primary featuring a multitude of candidates and a party wrestling with its identity.
Interviews with about four dozen lawmakers, consultants and party leaders revealed a mood of emphatic uncertainty: Senior Democrats see their party in a historically volatile state, and they are wary of attempting another Clinton-style coronation. But many Democrats believe the party’s turn left, combined with the rising fury of progressive women and the grass-roots appetite for a political brawler, have created an especially inviting environment for Warren.
Perhaps most appealing to Democratic leaders, Warren might please their activist base while staving off a candidate they fear would lose the general election.
A candidate such as Sanders. The 76-year-old Democratic socialist looms over the 2020 race, boasting an unmatched following among activists and a proven ability to raise millions of dollars online. Having pushed policies such as single-payer health care and free public college tuition into the Democratic mainstream, Sanders could be a powerful competitor for the nomination — and a daunting obstacle to Warren and other economic populists.
But for all the evident support for Sanders’ policy ideas, many in the party are skeptical that a fiery activist in his eighth decade would have broad enough appeal to oust Trump.
Sanders’ generational peer, Biden, 75, is preparing to test a contrasting message this fall, with plans to campaign up to four days a week after Labor Day, people familiar with his strategy said. In his speeches so far, Biden has struck a gentler chord than Sanders and Warren, delivering paeans to bipartisanship and beckoning Democrats to rise above Trump’s demagogic taunts.
And Biden, who has run for president twice before, has been seeking out a younger cohort of Democrats: During a trip to New Orleans in June he arranged a visit with Rep. Cedric Richmond, the 44-year-old chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, and this month he will travel to Arizona to help Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, the Democrats’ 41-yearold Senate candidate, and to address a gathering of the Latino advocacy group Lulac.
But Biden’s most important step so far has been to help install a close ally, James Smith, as the Democratic nominee for governor in the early primary state of South Carolina. Steve Benjamin, the Democratic mayor of Columbia, South Carolina’s capital, said Biden enjoys a close bond with party leaders there.
“The vice president has a lot of long and deep relationships in South Carolina, and they’re substantive relationships,” said Benjamin, acknowledging Biden’s staff had called him recently.
But Benjamin said Biden was not the only contender getting in touch: Aides to Warren also had contacted him, he said, to arrange a call with her about a visit he made to the Mexican border.
Biden is not committed to running and recognizes that the party is drifting from his institutionalist style and relative moderation, people who have spoken to him said.