ST. PAUL, Minnesota — A growing number of Democratic primary voters believe Elizabeth Warren can beat President Trump, even as the liberal firebrand’s appeal in critical Rust Belt battlegrounds remains questionable.
The Massachusetts senator is a culturally liberal Harvard Law professor who could have difficulty undercutting the president’s key advantage among the conservatively inclined white working class and rank-and-file union members. But the college-educated suburban Democrats at the heart of Warren’s burgeoning support, and festive, overflow campaign rallies, aren’t simply making political statements or expressing opposition to front-runner Joe Biden. They are becoming firm believers in her electability.
In interviews with the Washington Examiner, enthusiastic Warren supporters characterized their choice as logical and pragmatic, despite other Democratic contenders exceeding her performance against Trump in hypothetical matchups.
“I’ve always looked at the Midwest as being pretty middle class and I think that’s what she speaks to,” said Dan Lundborg, 53, a teacher from the Twin Cities who was among the 12,000 who showed up to see Warren in St. Paul, Minnesota’s capital, when asked why he believes the senator is best equipped to reclaim Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin for the Democratic Party in 2020.
Added Lundborg’s wife, Linda, 52, a school district secretary: “She understands what we’re going through.”
Warren’s momentum is real. The 70-year-old has climbed steadily from afterthought hamstrung by self-inflicted controversies surrounding her ethnic heritage to top-tier contender. Warren is running third nationally behind Biden, the former vice president, and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont; second in Iowa, host of the crucial first nominating; and third in New Hampshire. Her bid is bolstered by a sophisticated campaign organization.
But concerns about Warren’s electability persist. The senator lags with African Americans, a key Democratic constituency. Meanwhile, some party insiders fear white working-class voters in the heartland would find her just as unacceptable as they did Hillary Clinton in 2016. These voters, who proliferate throughout the Midwest and Florida, another important battleground, voted reliably Democratic for years until defecting to Trump.
“It will depend on how much the Republicans push the socialism thing,” said Julie Geopfert, Democratic chairwoman of Webster County, a region of rural Iowa that flipped to Trump after supporting Barack Obama for president twice. Geopfert conceded Warren could meet resistance in her community. “A lot of [voters] think that all of this stuff is going to cost them a whole more money in taxes and they’re just going to be giving stuff away.”
That “stuff” includes government-run healthcare, college tuition, child care, and other liberal priorities, part of a left-wing populist agenda Warren would subsidize by hiking taxes on the wealthy. Warren rejects suggestions that her programs would turn off voters in Midwestern battlegrounds that sided with Trump three years ago.
“I’ve been to blue states, red states, purples states, red parts of blue states — all because I’m reaching out to run for president of all of America,” Warren told reporters in St. Paul. “I think the core message that we’ve got a Washington that works great for the wealthy and the well-connected but is not working great for anyone else is something people get, whether they’re Democrats, Republicans, or independents.”
To some degree, Warren is a beneficiary of the Trump phenomenon.
The conventional media narrative about the populist Republican in 2016 was that his sharp tongue and hawkish position on immigration, among other issues, rendered him unelectable. He won, capturing three states a GOP nominee had not won in decades, plus battleground Florida. In Iowa and Ohio, two other swing states, Trump routed. That outcome is buoying Warren supporters amid naysayers and some polling data suggesting she might be a weak nominee.
“No one knows who can win,” said Sheri Smith, a Warren supporter in her early 50s who is on disability. “I don’t think you know; I don’t think I know and I don’t think anybody on Sunday morning really knows.”
Versus Biden in particular, the Trump factor is boosting Warren in other ways.
Democrats watched Clinton lose what many believed was an impossible race to lose, leading some primary voters this time around to conclude that only a challenger who is equally disruptive can oust Trump. Another establishment-oriented nominee, many Warren supporters argue, could depress Democratic turnout in 2020, even if that candidate is affiliated with a beloved figure such as Obama.
“A lot of people look toward the centrist to woo the voters in and I think that that is something that did us a disservice last time and I think that it would be more of a disservice this time,” said Justin Ropella, 36, a quality manager supporting Warren. “There aren’t people who are centrist that are going to be voting for Trump unless they’re already racists.”
