Former Attorney General Eric Holder is expected to announce whether he’ll run for president in the next two weeks.
A possible 2020 announcement would come on the heels of his trip to Iowa on Tuesday, where he’s giving a speech at Drake University Law School in Des Moines.
Holder is expected to condemn President Trump in his remarks, according to prepared remarks obtained by NPR.
“We should be dissatisfied with an administration rife with corruption, stunning incompetence, and shameful intolerance,” Holder will say in his speech. “Most of all, we should be dissatisfied by that same administration’s total abdication of moral and policy leadership — and its failure to address the many other urgent challenges we face: A democracy that’s under attack. A climate crisis that’s ignored. And racial and cultural divisions that are weaponized and exploited for political gain.”
“I am dissatisfied — just as so many of you are dissatisfied — with the inequities that continue to divide us, the injustices all around us, and the refusal of some elected leaders to rise to this defining moment,” Holder will say. “That’s why I cannot be silent — and I hope you won’t be silent — as our nation confronts this time of challenge and consequence.”
If Holder enters the 2020 race, it would be his first run for public office. The former attorney general served as deputy attorney general under former President Bill Clinton, then led the Justice Department under former President Barack Obama. Since leaving the department in 2015, he has chaired the new National Democratic Redistricting Committee, aimed at challenging gerrymandering, and rejoined a private law firm.
[Previous coverage: Eric Holder heading to Iowa amid 2020 speculation]
