People are talking about an Oprah Winfrey presidential candidacy after her speech at the Golden Globes. It’s probably a good time to say some general things about X-for-President conversations as they relate to 2020.
1. The Democratic field is going to be packed. I’d guess that at least half of the following are going to offer themselves as options, at least in the early stages: Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders. There will be many others too. I remember Jeff Merkley telling me that every Republican Senator looks at Trump and thinks: “I could do so much better!” and every Democratic Senator thinks “I could totally beat him!”
We’re going to have way more choices than we did in 2016 when everybody got out of Hillary’s way, except for Bernie who probably was just running to bring left-wing issues into the conversation… until a movement formed up behind him. So if 2016 has led you to think we'll have a shortage of options, we’ll have a lot more options in 2020, and it’s worth looking into them.
2. Given that we’re going to have a densely packed field, I’m just going to let candidates bid for my support by coming out with innovative policy proposals. This primary needs to be policy-dense, with candidates pledging support for things like Medicare for All, defense cuts, opening up immigration, marijuana legalization, and foreign policy ideas that prevent the collapse of the world into feuding illiberal ethnic nationalist regimes. I expect to vote for a candidate with a good package of all that stuff, plus good favorability ratings when early 2020 rolls around and the polling isn’t all name-recognition effects.
There’s a decent chance of unified Democratic control of Congress in 2020, and we need to hit the ground running and pass big stuff fast. If Oprah comes out with the best policy ideas on stuff like this, I could see voting for her, but since she hasn’t been in the business of doing that before it’s a bit hard to expect.
3. Oprah is uniquely well-positioned to make a big impact on the 2020 race, as a power broker rather than a candidate. She could start a show sometime in 2019 where she interviews the leading primary candidates, asks them questions, and presses them to sign onto her favored policies. This is broadly like the role that Al Gore played in the 2008 primary – instead of running, he let the candidates compete for his support with good climate-change policies. Everybody came out in favor of cap-and-trade, and there was enough of a party consensus behind the policy that Nancy Pelosi got it through the House. If not for the filibuster, we’d have passed major climate change legislation in 2010.
Oprah’s media profile gives her the ability to galvanize support behind a favored policy in a much bigger way than Gore did. Moderating Democratic primary debates would also be a natural extension of her core skills. If I were a person Oprah listened to, I'd say: do that!
1. The Democratic field is going to be packed. I’d guess that at least half of the following are going to offer themselves as options, at least in the early stages: Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders. There will be many others too. I remember Jeff Merkley telling me that every Republican Senator looks at Trump and thinks: “I could do so much better!” and every Democratic Senator thinks “I could totally beat him!”
We’re going to have way more choices than we did in 2016 when everybody got out of Hillary’s way, except for Bernie who probably was just running to bring left-wing issues into the conversation… until a movement formed up behind him. So if 2016 has led you to think we'll have a shortage of options, we’ll have a lot more options in 2020, and it’s worth looking into them.
2. Given that we’re going to have a densely packed field, I’m just going to let candidates bid for my support by coming out with innovative policy proposals. This primary needs to be policy-dense, with candidates pledging support for things like Medicare for All, defense cuts, opening up immigration, marijuana legalization, and foreign policy ideas that prevent the collapse of the world into feuding illiberal ethnic nationalist regimes. I expect to vote for a candidate with a good package of all that stuff, plus good favorability ratings when early 2020 rolls around and the polling isn’t all name-recognition effects.
There’s a decent chance of unified Democratic control of Congress in 2020, and we need to hit the ground running and pass big stuff fast. If Oprah comes out with the best policy ideas on stuff like this, I could see voting for her, but since she hasn’t been in the business of doing that before it’s a bit hard to expect.
3. Oprah is uniquely well-positioned to make a big impact on the 2020 race, as a power broker rather than a candidate. She could start a show sometime in 2019 where she interviews the leading primary candidates, asks them questions, and presses them to sign onto her favored policies. This is broadly like the role that Al Gore played in the 2008 primary – instead of running, he let the candidates compete for his support with good climate-change policies. Everybody came out in favor of cap-and-trade, and there was enough of a party consensus behind the policy that Nancy Pelosi got it through the House. If not for the filibuster, we’d have passed major climate change legislation in 2010.
Oprah’s media profile gives her the ability to galvanize support behind a favored policy in a much bigger way than Gore did. Moderating Democratic primary debates would also be a natural extension of her core skills. If I were a person Oprah listened to, I'd say: do that!
