Rare Contributor
Former President Barack Obama and his advisers are reportedly encouraging former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick (D) to consider a 2020 run for president, according to POLITICO.
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Patrick and Obama are close personal friends, and he is one of the few people that the former president considers to have “political talent” and has privately encouraged him to run.
Obama’s former adviser Valerie Jarrett also said that it would be what her heart “desires” to see Patrick make a run for the United State’s highest political office.
“If you were to poll 100 notable Obama alumni, the only two people who would win that 2020 straw poll right now are [Joe] Biden and Patrick,” one former senior White House aide said.
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However, former Vice President Joe Biden has done more to encourage hope for a possible run by scheduling trips to Florida and New Hampshire in the not-so-distant future. Patrick, on the other hand, has said he thinks it’s too early to start thinking about 2020.
“I’m trying to think about how to be helpful because I care about the country, and I’m a patriot first. It’s way, way too soon to be making plans for 2020,” Patrick said during an interview on POLITICO’s Off Message podcast. “So I’ll just leave it at that.”
Patrick is extremely upset by what he sees President Donald Trump doing to the country, though, saying during the interview, “The president, I believe, is at risk of diminishing the voice of the presidency because he pops off so often, and so, kind of, carelessly. I think there is a risk both domestically, and internationally for that matter, that we’ll begin to tune him out.”
