Gillibrand jumps into 2020 race by telling Iowa she’s a fighter for families
SIOUX CITY, IOWA — Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand introduced herself to Iowa Democrats on Friday as a common-sense fighter for family, and especially children’s, issues, in her first visit to the early-voting state as a 2020 Democratic presidential prospect.
Unlike some of her potential rivals, the New York senator is starting from scratch in a state where few Democratic activists have a strong impression of her and where some say she’s known more for the criticisms of her.
“We have to take on these systems of power that destroy our hopes” for better lives for families, Gillibrand told a dozen Sioux City Democrats at a coffee shop in the western Iowa city. “That’s why I’m running, and that’s what I think we have to fight for.”
Gillibrand, who announced her intention to run on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on Tuesday, wasted little time getting to the state where the 2020 caucuses launch the Democratic presidential selection process.
Sioux City Democrat Linda Santi was impressed by what she saw in Gillibrand.
“She showed a soft-spoken passion,” said Santi, a consultant for a nonprofit group. “I felt like she was listening.”
What little Sandi O’Brien, co-chairwoman of the Woodbury County Democrats, knew about Gillibrand was criticism she had seen on social media. “I don’t know a lot of detail,” O’Brien said, as Gillibrand entered the coffee shop, where news media outnumbered Democratic activists. “I know people have been critical that she’s changed positions on immigration and gun control.”
Gillibrand initially positioned herself more in line with the conservative House district she represented before 2009, when she replaced Hillary Clinton as New York’s junior senator.
Gillibrand was asked to explain the change during a gathering of party activists in Sioux City at the private home of a prominent Democrat. Gillibrand told the roughly two dozen guests that after she had become a senator, she met with the family and friends of a teenage girl shot and killed in Brooklyn. “I had just felt convicted that I had done the wrong thing” by opposing gun control, she said. “And if I’m unwilling to fight for her family, I’m not doing my job.”
On immigration, she has now called for retooling the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
Likewise, she was asked why she was the first public advocate for former Minnesota Sen. Al Franken to resign. Gillibrand has faced withering criticism from Democrats who said Franken, who resigned his seat in December 2017 after allegations by women that he had groped them, had done far less than what other men have been accused of doing, chiefly President Donald Trump, though the president has denied all allegations of sexual impropriety.
“It wasn’t possible for me to remain silent because what my silence meant was defending him,” she said. “You have to stand up for what’s right, especially when it’s hard.”
Cindy Paschen, an Ames Democrat who plans to meet Gillibrand when she visits central Iowa on Saturday, said the senator’s position on Franken was “the right thing to do.”
“I totally support her calling him out,” she said.
On Friday, Gillibrand headlined the house gathering after chatting for 45 minutes with Iowans and the entourage of media in the coffee shop.
She was scheduled to make a variety of appearances Saturday, including coffee-shop and brew-pub talks in Ames and Des Moines, as well as speaking at the Women’s March in Des Moines.
She also was to meet privately with party leaders and influential Democratic activists along the way.
Gillibrand’s Iowa trip is the beginning of her journey to introduce herself to Americans outside New York, which she has represented in Washington since 2006. She has distinguished herself with her opposition to Trump and her forceful advocacy for victims of sexual assault and harassment.