Early on the primary season, I wholeheartedly joined “Team Warren.” I felt that not only was the she best candidate to actually be president, but that she had the best chance of beating Trump. I was in. I was enthusiastic and I was ready to fight for her and the America I felt she would lead.
And although none of the things I loved about Warren changed, I found my enthusiasm for her wane in the last couple of months. It is not so much that I like Warren less, but somehow I find myself wondering if other candidates might be better to support.
Polls suggest that I am not alone.
So this past weekend, I made myself really take apart what changed my mind. Why did I go from “Team Warren” to team “not so sure”?
I realized that this all started when the tension broke out between her and Bernie. I started seeing negative things written about Warren by people who like Bernie and, while the arguments didn’t change my feelings about her, the fact that people were arguing worried me a lot.
The scars of 2016 are deep and fresh. And a part of me thought, “maybe it would be safer to have Bernie rather than risk people who like him staying home.” Or, “maybe Biden would be better because he is always the strongest against Trump in the polls.”
Instead of following my heart and mind and sticking with the candidate who I really believe would both be best as president AND would be able to beat Trump, I was worrying more about what other people would feel and how other people would act and how to make other people happy.
Of course, I was. That is how women are raised to think. We want everyone to be happy. We feel uncomfortable choosing a course of action that makes people we care about angry or upset.
And that is why I think Warren has been sliding recently. It isn’t that she wouldn’t be a great president (she would) or that she couldn’t win (she could) but things got *uncomfortable* in the race and women are taught to hate discomfort when it happens with their friends and allies. We are raised to do all we can to make that discomfort go away. And if supporting Biden or Bernie or Pete will do that then… we’ll switch. This unconscious desire to not rock the boat and not make our friends mad is powerful and I think it is pulling support from Warren.
Intra-party fighting makes Bernie and Biden supporters draw even closer to their candidates and champion them even more. But because of deeply ingrained gender norms, it makes some Warren supporters uncomfortable on a level we can’t even verbalize and it makes us change our attitudes: just a little perhaps, but just enough to see her slip in the polls.
For me, realizing where my uncertainty came from has been freeing. I am done with that. I am done worrying about making others uncomfortable. I am done questioning my preferences because of how they might make others feel.
I am on team Warren for this primary season. I will vote for her, campaign for her, and encourage others to do so.
Because it is easy to see why Warren would be a great president. She has plans for everything. The plans are smart, evidence based, and filled with both heart and reason. Is every plan perfect? Nope. But they are all strong and they are all starting points for actually using her presidency — from day one — to make a difference. It isn’t just talk with Warren.
I also think Warren will be able to bring over voters from the other side. She comes for an Oklahoma military family. Due to that background, she was a registered Republican until the mid 1990s. What changed? She learned more about the balance of power between hard working people and companies and it forever changed her:
Through the 1980s, the work took her to courthouses across the country. There, she said in a recent interview, she found not only the dusty bankruptcy files she had gone looking for but heart-wrenching scenes she hadn’t imagined — average working Americans, tearful and humiliated, admitting they were failures:
“People dressed in their Sunday best, hands shaking, women clutching a handful of tissues, trying to stay under control. Big beefy men whose faces were red and kept wiping their eyes, who showed up in court to declare themselves losers in the great American game of life.”
Ms. Warren’s political awakening didn’t simply happen all at once. Her road to Damascus was a long one. But over several decades, she transformed from a largely pro-business and politically disengaged academic — a sort of default Republican — to a fierce consumer advocate and bankruptcy expert whose advice was sought on Capitol Hill, and then, finally, to a Democratic force on the Hill herself.
Some people may scoff at someone who started out a Republican and now is one of our leading progressive voices. But I love that about her for two reasons. First, as Law Professor Jay L. Westbrook says about her “She is really someone who is willing to learn and willing to be persuaded.” Frankly, after four years of Trump, I think this country is desperate for someone who is willing to learn and listen and do the right thing, even if it means admitting that you changed your mind.
Second, Elizabeth Warren’s unique position as a former Republican who came to our party may bring some voters over as well. In particular because she switched due to an issue that we know brings people over: realizing that we have a system that is rigged against average Americans.
And the data suggest that this does draw people in:
Polls show Warren’s message that the economic system is rigged against ordinary people — and her willingness to unapologetically call for fundamental structural changes in the rules of the economic game — are very attractive to white working-class vote-switchers in the upper Midwest who haven’t had a raise that outstrips inflation in 30 years.
And some have argued that unlike 2016, having a woman candidate will actually help us in 2020
In 2020, being a woman is a political asset. It promises to be the year that women strike back.
Women are overwhelmingly disgusted by Trump. They’re disgusted by his sexism, lack of empathy, macho blustering and crude disrespectful language. They’re disgusted when they see children ripped from mothers’ arms at the border. They’re furious that he’s placing anti-abortion justices on the Supreme Court.
Women are mobilized like never before in American politics. A woman heading the ticket gives American women one more reason to work their hearts out and turn out in record numbers next fall.
I also like her because, time and time again, she has shown that she is willing to do unpopular things because they are the right things to do
In the waning days of the Obama administration, Warren opposed a bill that was ridiculously popular with key Massachusetts constituencies because she thought Republicans had turned it into a handout to “Big Pharma.”
In addition, she has proven she can work with people on both sides of the aisle when it means getting good things done for Americans.
She introduced legislation with GOP Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa to make hearing aids available over-the-counter, for example. She cosponsored the “Smart Savings Act” with GOP Senator Rob Portman of Ohio to boost federal employees’ savings; an opioids bill with Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia; and, with John Cornyn of Texas, legislation to make it easier for veterans to obtain commercial driver’s licenses.
For those, and many other reasons, I support Elizabeth Warren for President. She is a progressive voice that can get things done.
I recommitted myself just this morning by donating to her campaign. If you want, you can do that at this link.
Finally, it should go without saying that I am team #BlueNoMatterWho. Not only will I vote for WHOMEVER we nominate but I will donate, go door to door, and drive people to the polls for that person. We have a lot of great candidates and even the ones I love least are a billion times better than Trump.
But until we have a candidate, I am no longer going to be silent or wishy washy or complacent in my preferences. I am proud to support Elizabeth Warren.