Former Vice President Joe Biden has “the best case” to be the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee, according to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Wednesday.
“I think Joe Biden has the best case because he brings the most of the secret ingredient you need to win for a Democrat, which is credibility,” Cuomo, who started his third term in New York’s governor’s mansion Tuesday, told WAMC.
But he told the radio station Wednesday that a winning strategy would also have to be based on something other than an “anti-Trump feeling” since “it doesn’t take much to say I oppose Donald Trump as a Democrat.”
“I think that the main issue for the Democrats is not going to be the articulation of the negative; it is going to be the articulation of the positive,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo, who took himself out of 2020 contention last November, predicted credibility would be the key underlying issue because President Trump’s election symbolized “a rejection of the entire system” triggered by voters who “don’t believe anyone.”
Biden is a front-runner in early polls, but the Democratic primary field could include more than two dozen candidates. Other initial favorites are Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and outgoing Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas.
Biden, who has said he’ll make a final decision about running for the White House early this year, last month described himself as the “most qualified person in the country to be president.”
