CNN political commentator and adviser to former President Barack Obama, David Axelrod declared that 2020 Democratic contender Elizabeth Warren is running a “stragically brillant campaign” in an op-ed for the outlet.
In the post published Saturday, Axelrod revealed his “reflections on a stormy and revealing week in the Democratic presidential race.”
“The first is that Elizabeth Warren is running a strategically brilliant campaign,” he wrote. “More than any other candidate, she has a clear, unambiguous message that is thoroughly integrated with her biography. That is essential to a successful campaign.
“Her unsparing critique of corporate excess and her expansive — and expensive — agenda for change mirror those of the reigning left champion, Bernie Sanders, in places,” he continued. “But where Sanders sometimes seems like a parody of himself — or of Larry David’s parody of Sanders — Warren seems fresher, deeper, and more precise in her execution.”
He then pointed to the moment during the Democrats’ second round of debates, during which she admonished opponent Tim Ryan for going through “the trouble of running for president of the United States just to talk about what we really can’t do and shouldn’t fight for.”
“The jibe, like her entire campaign, is exhilarating to Democrats who have no patience for the incrementalism that governing in a big, diverse and closely divided democracy requires,” Axlerod wrote, likening Warren’s ability to put her critics on the defensive to how “Barack Obama put Hillary Clinton on the defensive in 2008, when she argued that Obama’s plans were fantastical in the real world of Washington.”
While he admitted the Massachusetts senator “can be off-putting” and that “there are legitimate critiques of her policy on substantive and not just political grounds,” he nonetheless asserted, “Warren has a theory of the case and is prosecuting it very skillfully.”
Axelrod also gave props to South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker for their debate performances while noting that former Vice President Joe Biden and California Sen. Kamala Harris have some work to do next time around.
