Behind the scenes at Netroots Nation, the country’s biggest progressive conference, Daily Kos met with nearly 30 activists, politicians, and progressive leaders, including four presidential hopefuls. Our new interview series, “Making Progress,” gives candidates the opportunity to talk about their hopes and plans for a better tomorrow. With just several questions each, participants didn’t waste words delivering the messages they most want voters to hear.
Elizabeth Warren, Democratic senator from Massachusetts and 2020 presidential hopeful, chatted with Daily Kos for an exclusive interview, which is embedded below. Warren, who is running a grassroots campaign focused on small-dollar donations, talked to Daily Kos about life on the campaign trail, what she often wishes she had the chance to tell the public, and her ideas about a very different kind of United States.
A transcript is below.
Question 1: What’s the most inspiring thing you’ve seen or heard on the campaign trail?
EW: Oh, it’s the people who talk about how hard the fight is but they’re staying in it. I met a mama with a little girl who, after we took our pictures, she whispered in my ear: please, please, please, Medicare for All. Because her daughter has brain cancer. And she said, without that, I’m afraid we’re not going to get covered. Young people who hold out their hands and say: $628 a month. Because that’s how big their student loan payments are. But every one of them stays in the fight. And that’s the inspiring part. We’re gonna do this together.
Question 2: What do you wish you had more time to talk about as a presidential candidate?
EW: I wish I had more time to talk about how corruption infects every decision that gets made in Washington. How the money—campaign contributions and so much more—it’s about the bought-and-paid-for experts. It’s about the armies of lobbyists. It’s about the bought-and-paid-for think tanks. And that if we don’t attack that corruption head-on; if we don’t get the oil industry, for example, out of decision-making about climate, we can’t make the fixes we need to make. … We can’t really get a Green New Deal that’s going to mean something through. We can’t get health care that we need. We can’t get the gun safety that we need. We can’t make the investments in our children—because we can’t get the taxes—that we need.
This government works great for those in the very top. … for the richest people in this country and the corporate CEOs. Our chance in 2020 is to make it work for everyone else. And it really starts by seizing power together and understanding how all these pieces are tied together. Your fight is her fight, is his fight—we gotta be in this one together.
Question 3: What does President Elizabeth Warren’s America look like?
EW: It looks like an America where everybody gets a chance. Where everybody gets an opportunity. … An opportunity for a great education, an opportunity to get a really good job. An opportunity to be able to start a small business. An opportunity to marry the person you love and maybe start a family, buy a home. I was a special needs teacher and I understand: opportunity looks different for different people. Maybe it’s just, maybe it’s an opportunity to live independently.
But here’s what I know: My daddy ended up as a janitor but his baby daughter got the opportunity to become a public school teacher, to become a college professor, to become a United States senator, and to become a candidate for president of the United States. Dream big, fight hard. That’s how we win.
Bonus Question: If you could give advice to your teenage self, what would it be?
EW: Don’t worry so much. It’s gonna come out all right. Stay in the fight. I remember how scared I was about all of it. We didn’t have money. I saw the other kids do other things that I wasn’t gonna get a chance to do. So I stayed in the fight. But what I’d say to myself: Don’t take it so hard. Stay in, you’ll make it, kid. And I did. And you know why? Because those opportunities were out there. The $50-semester college? The $450-semester law school? My aunt Bea who came to live with me so I had childcare when my kids were little and I was trying to get a job underway. It worked out for me. I just want an America where it works out for everybody else.
If you want to read about Warren, make sure to check out our coverage on her plans for immigration, banning private prisons, and student debt relief.
And be sure to watch the Daily Kos YouTube for our next “Making Progress” video. The week of July 15, we’ll release exclusive interviews from four Democrats vying for the presidential nomination. After that, we’ll release an exclusive with a progressive organizer, activist, or politician every Tuesday.
Who’s up next? None other than Julián Castro.
