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Howard Schultz, the former chief executive of Starbucks, who had taken action earlier this year to prepare to run for the independent presidency, announced Friday that he was abandoning these projects.
In a letter to his supporters, Mr. Schultz stated that he had concluded that an independent bid would pose too great a risk to help President Trump win a second term.
"Not enough people today are willing to consider supporting an independent candidate because they fear this will lead to the re-election of a particularly dangerous outgoing president," wrote Schultz.
Schultz, 66, said he would not intervene in 2020 if the Democrats chose a more moderate candidate. He criticized the party's most progressive candidates by writing: "I am also concerned that the ideas of the far-left party put forward by several Democratic candidates will further distance voters who believe that these ideas will inflict more economic harm than good".
This announcement marks 15 months of speculation about Mr. Schultz's intentions. During this period, the Democratic primary field has reached 24 candidates and has since been reduced to 20. There have been two rounds of nationally televised Democrat debates, with a third debate scheduled for next week.
One of the Democrats in the running, Tom Steyer, is a billionaire like Mr. Schultz. Despite spending millions of dollars of his own money on advertising, he was unable to qualify for next week's debate because of weak support from polls.
In June 2018, Mr. Schultz announced that he would leave Starbucks after more than three decades of leadership of the company, immediately fueling speculation about a race to 2020. He hardly acted to dismiss this possibility at the time, saying "deeply concerned" by the country.
Seven months later, in January, Mr. Schultz announced that he was considering traveling the country as part of a reading tour and that he had begun the necessary work to be able to vote on the ballot boxes in the 50 states. He said that if he decided to run for office, he would do so as an independent, arguing that Republicans and moderate Democrats were "looking for a home" and
His movement towards running immediately attracted criticism from Democrats and President Trump, who began what would become months of public pleadings from those who feared that an independent offer would only help M Trump to be reelected by separating the anti-trump. vote.
A few days after his January announcement, Schultz attracted in his hometown, Seattle, the city where he built a modest coffee bean retailer into a global giant and enriched his wealth by billions.
Mr Schultz was also injured on the back in April, quoted in his Friday letter as one of the factors in his decision.
Mr. Schultz said that the money that he had been willing to spend for a presidential campaign would rather be invested "in people, organizations and ideas that promote honesty, civility and civility. results of our policy, and that would allow the country to break the stalemate of the two parties. "
"My first efforts will be to advocate for increased national service opportunities for youth," he said. "I will continue to work with my wife, Sheri, supporting our country's veterans and second-hand youth from the Schultz Family Foundation. And I will continue to personally encourage business leaders to play a greater role in creating access to opportunities for people in the communities they serve and beyond. "
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