Hickenlooper drops out, mulls Senate run
Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper on Thursday ended his longshot bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, saying he may instead challenge one of the most vulnerable Senate Republicans in 2020.
In a video message, Hickenlooper said he had heard from many in his state urging him to enter the Senate race.
“They remind me how much is at stake for our country. And our state,” he said. “I intend to give that some serious thought.”
Colorado’s shift to the left could put Sen. Cory Gardner’s seat in jeopardy for Republicans, and at least 10 Democrats have launched campaigns, setting up a competitive primary even before Hickenlooper, 67, makes a decision.
Hickenlooper began his White House campaign in March, promising to unite the country. He positioned himself as a common-sense candidate who couldn’t be labeled a “socialist” by Republicans. But Hickenlooper couldn’t make his voice heard in the crowded Democratic field of about two dozen candidates.
Republicans seized on the meltdown of Hickenlooper’s campaign as evidence the Democratic Party has become too radical. “A two-term governor of a swing state and #2020 presidential #Democrat candidate who was booed for warning against his party’s embrace of socialist policies has been forced out of the race,” tweeted Kellyanne Conway, a top Trump aide, on Thursday. “Not left-wing enough …”
Democrat Beto O’rourke rejoined the presidential race Thursday, nearly two weeks after a mass shooting in his Texas hometown, by using a speech in El Paso to try to overhaul his White House bid and argue that President Donald Trump is morally unfit for a second term.
The former congressman spoke at a park close to his home, saying that what happened in El Paso “is an attack on America” and “an attack on our ideal of what America John Hickenlooper says he may try to represent his state of Colorado next as a U.S. senator.
can be.”
He blamed assault weapons and endorsed a federal buyback program for them while criticizing Trump.
“We must take the fight directly to the source of this problem, that person who has caused this pain and placed this country in this moment of peril, and that is Donald Trump,” O’rourke said during an emotional, 30-plus-minute address.
“I’m confident that, if at this moment we do not wake up to this threat, then we, as a country, will die in
our sleep.”
Rather than focus just on early primary states, O’rourke now says he’ll travel to “those places where Donald Trump has been terrorizing and terrifying and demeaning our fellow Americans.”
O’rourke will start Friday by heading to Mississippi, where federal immigration agents last week arrested 680 Latino workers in a massive workplace sting at seven chicken processing plants, shocking their communities.
President Donald Trump returned Thursday to New Hampshire, the state that gave him his first presidential primary victory, and told supporters that even if they don’t like him, they have to vote for him because their retirements depend on it.
Speaking at an evening rally for his reelection campaign in Manchester, Trump downplayed fears of an economic recession while highlighting positive economic indicators.
He warned that if he loses in 2020, Americans’ 401(k) retirement accounts will go “down the tubes.” He said: “Whether you love me or hate me, you have to vote for me.”
Trump also sang the praises of his former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, who’s considering a run for the Senate in New Hampshire. Democrat Jeanne Shaheen is up for re-election.
Trump described Lewandowski as “tough and smart” and said he was the first person who told him he could win the White House.