Elizabeth Warren has another decision to make.
The Massachusetts Democrat is out of the presidential race, but her role in shaping its outcome is far from over. With just a few days now until another round of crucial primaries, she has reclaimed the spotlight as Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Vice President Joe Biden vie for her support.
But as Warren made clear during a news conference outside her home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Thursday, she will not rush into the hopeful arms of either camp.
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“I need some space around this, and I want to take a little time to think a little more,” she said. “I’ve been spending a lot of time right now on the question of suspending and making sure that this works as best we can for our staff, for our team, for our volunteers.”
Endorsing Sanders might seem to be the natural choice, given their largely overlapping political messages. But the bruises of the campaign season, which included a very personal confrontation between the candidates in January, have not yet faded and a once-strong relationship appears frayed. Warren’s deliberation could also be impacted by the trajectory of the race, with Biden reclaiming his front-runner status after a romp in South Carolina last Saturday and a series of surprising wins on Super Tuesday. If Warren were to endorse the former vice president, it would be a crushing blow to Sanders, but it could potentially guarantee her – and progressives – a position of influence in or around a Biden White House.
Warren and Sanders have spoken twice over the past two days, according to his recent comments – once on Wednesday and again, he said, on Thursday before she gave her farewell news conference. Warren and Biden had a call on Wednesday. But all parties have been tight-lipped about the contents of those conversations. Sanders’ campaign staff, during what turned out to be the final days of Warren’s campaign, were careful not to be seen pressuring her to drop out or soliciting her support.
That posture has been reflected by influential progressive groups that, despite their obvious hope Warren will throw her support to Sanders, have been cautious in publicly lobbying her.
“Elizabeth Warren is a champion of the progressive movement who has a number of supporters, who voted for Bernie in 2016, who will likely decide today that they’re going to vote for Bernie going forward,” said Waleed Shahid, from the progressive group Justice Democrats. “And then she has another part of her base that voted for Hillary in 2016, who are likely still undecided.”
An endorsement of Sanders, he said, “would go a long way” in driving the fence-sitters into the Vermont senator’s camp.
There has been a quiet – by social media standards – debate on the left for months now, since Warren began to plummet in the polls toward the end of 2019, over whether her presence in the race hurt or helped Sanders, a political ally for decades. The demographic makeup of Warren’s support, which skews toward white, college-educated suburbanites, suggests that Sanders – who struggles with that cohort – will not enjoy a ready-made boost following her exit.
But there is a countervailing belief that if Warren were to go all-in for Sanders, she could help bridge that gap and deliver new energy to his stagnating movement.
That viewpoint – and desire – was voiced by Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar late on Tuesday night as the force of the Biden surge, powered in part by the coalescing of moderate former candidates around him, became clear.
“Imagine if the progressives consolidated last night like the moderates consolidated,” tweeted Omar, a Sanders supporter and surrogate, “who would have won? That’s what we should be analyzing. I feel confident a united progressive movement would have allowed for us to #BuildTogether and win MN and other states we narrowly lost.”
The liberal Working Families Party, which endorsed Warren last September, is also planning its next move. In a statement Thursday, it praised her campaign and made no mention of Sanders – or anyone else.
“The contest is poorer for Senator Warren’s exit,” Working Families Party national director Maurice Mitchell said in a statement. “It has been an honor to be a part of this fight with Elizabeth. Her presidential campaign may be over, but the fight for her vision of big, structural change continues.”
Senior Working Families Party officials have remained in regular contact with Warren’s team, but a spokesman for the party declined to characterize the content of those discussions.
While the political world keeps its eyes on Warren, Sanders didn’t have to wait long to win the support of activist Ady Barkan, who endorsed Warren in November. Barkan, who has ALS, is a respected progressive grassroots leader.
In a tweet, he credited Sanders with doing “more than anyone else to build the movement for ‘Medicare for All.’ “
“But, of course, it’s not about him. It’s about us,” Barkan wrote, echoing Sanders’ campaign slogan. “And I’m all in.”