“Without Warren, there wouldn’t have been the robust ideas primary which moved this country forward.”
By Jon Queally, staff writer – Common Dreams
Prompting immediate questions of what she does next, Sen. Elizabeth Warren is ending her 2020 presidential campaign, multiple media outlets reported Thursday morning.
Citing a person close to Warren, the New York Times reports that the Massachusetts senator is “ending a run defined by an avalanche of policy plans that aimed to pull the Democratic Party to the left and appealed to enough voters to make her briefly a front-runner last fall, but that proved unable to translate excitement from elite progressives into backing from the party’s more working-class and diverse base.”
The decision to end her bid comes after failing to perform as well as she hoped in early primary states and on Super Tuesday. Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders hope that even as she leaves the race she will throw her support behind their candidate in order to form a united “progressive front” to take on the powerful corporate forces now lined up behind former Vice President Joe Biden.
Warren is expected to speak with her staff later Thursday morning before making any public comments. There has been no indication yet if Warren would endorse Sanders or Biden—or not endorse at all. Progressives responded to the news by thanking Warren and celebrating her “brilliant” and issue-focused campaign:
If the reports are true and @ewarren is suspending her campaign, I have two things to say:
1. Thank you for this campaign.
2. Thank you for the brilliant ideas—and the vital plans—that will go forward from this campaign.
Like this one ? https://t.co/94zyFEPabJ
— John Nichols (@NicholsUprising) March 5, 2020
While I’m (obviously) a Bernie supporter, the only reason Elizabeth Warren came in behind a dozey old man like Biden and a smarmy nonentity like Pete is because of sexism. This country hates women, and intellectual women most of all. https://t.co/4qbcpX0jbw
— Molly Crabapple?? (@mollycrabapple) March 5, 2020
People for Bernie, a volunteer-led advocacy group that backs Sanders, tweeted:
Thank you @ewarren, her staff, and her supporters for running a strong issue based campaign that created space for supporters to build, not tear down.
Without Warren, there wouldn’t have been the robust ideas primary which moved this country forward. https://t.co/40TXdWFpeX
— People for Bernie (@People4Bernie) March 5, 2020
As journalist and political activist Norman Solomon wrote in a Common Dreams op-ed ahead of Thursday’s announcement, the “urgency” of Warren’s endorsement decision “can hardly be overstated.” He wrote:
Sanders and Biden are fiercely competing for votes in a half-dozen states with March 10 primaries including Michigan (with 125 delegates), Washington (89 delegates) and Missouri (68 delegates). A week later, primaries in four states—Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Ohio—will determine the allocation of 577 delegates.
In the midst of these pivotal election battles, Warren should provide a vehement endorsement of Sanders and swiftly begin to campaign for him. Choosing, instead, to stand on the sidelines would be a tragic betrayal of progressive principles.
And journalist Ross Barkan tweeted:
The Elizabeth Warren endorsement matters for Bernie Sanders because there’s a gap in time that needs to be filled with a news cycle. Right now it’s all bad for Bernie. Cable TV will just talk about how he got beat on Super Tuesday.
Warren endorses soon and that’s the top story.
— Ross Barkan (@RossBarkan) March 5, 2020
Warren announced her campaign in February of 2019, when she promised to take on the “rigged system that props up the rich and powerful.”
