Sen. Cory Booker announced on Friday morning that he is running for president in 2020, throwing his hat into what is shaping up to be one of the most crowded Democratic primaries in living memory.
Booker, a junior senator from New Jersey and former mayor of Newark, made the announcement in a two-and-a-half minute video he posted to Twitter.
Booker’s decision to run is no surprise, having been widely trailed for months. He joins, among many other people, fellow senators Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, and Kirsten Gillibrand on the 2020 trail.
Now that Harris’ race has begun gaining momentum, Booker is apparently anxious to prevent her from pulling too far ahead, The Hill reported. Both Harris and Booker attended a Congressional Black Caucus policy retreat on Wednesday. “I’m excited for the candidates already out there. It’s really good for the Democratic Party and it’s just a good thing,” Booker told The Hill as he left the meeting. “I’m excited about Kamala’s candidacy. It’s incredible. It’s historic.”
In the past, Booker has been criticized by the Democratic Party’s left wing for his connections to Wall Street, charter schools, and corporate donors. In 2018, he tweeted that he would no longer accept donations from corporate PACs. In 2017, Booker did sign on to Bernie Sanders’ Medicare for All bill, hopefully an indication that he’d support the policy as president.
But what would Booker’s campaign actually look like? Well, according to a CNN report from January, his campaign could be “centered on the message of unity and love,” something that’s a bit hard to imagine catching on in our current political climate. Seems like we’re about to find out!