Cory Booker Announces 2020 Presidential Race: NPR

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Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., Visits Masterpiece Barber College while campaigning for Nevada Democratic candidates in October 2018 in Las Vegas, Nev.

Ethan Miller / Getty Images

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Ethan Miller / Getty Images

Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., Visits Masterpiece Barber College while campaigning for Democratic candidates in Nevada in October 2018 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Ethan Miller / Getty Images

The New Jersey Senator, Cory Booker, is the last Democrat to be engaged in the increasingly congested White House race, announcing the initial announcement with a message of "no". unit.

"We are better at helping each other," says Booker. in a video message. "I think we can build a country where no one is forgotten or left behind, where parents can feed their children, where there are well-paying jobs with great benefits in every neighborhood, where our criminal justice system gives us Keeps it safe, instead of putting more children in cages and cages, we see the faces of our leaders on TV and we feel pride and not shame. "

The video sets the tone for a campaign supposed to thwart the divisional base of President Trump.

Booker's goal, he told NPR in 2017, is "not to encounter hate with hatred, but to meet it with love." Not to encounter darkness with darkness, but meet them with the light, I really think that we are at a moral moment in our country.The only way to move this country in the way it needs is to not tell others what they are doing. you, but putting the values ​​we believe in. "

Booker planned a series of media appearances as part of its launch on Friday, including Univision's Tom Joyner Morning Show Despierta America and ABC The View .

Booker, 49, former mayor of Newark, elected for the first time in the Senate following the 2013 special election, has long been considered a likely candidate to challenge President Trump. He made it clear that he was likely to make some strategic changes, joining the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2017, and making frequent trips to the first primary voting states such as Iowa and New Hampshire. to raise funds and campaign for local candidates in the 2018 mid-term elections.

His travels left a positive impression among several primary school and caucus policy professionals. Jim Devers, who co-chaired Barack Obama's New Hampshire campaign in 2008, told NPR that Booker had "built his career on a message of unity." And I think citizens across the country are tired of the Americans being divided. " [19659015] Democrats Seek Presidential Election "Medicare-For-All" “/>

Even before his election to the Senate, Booker had already attracted a national audience as Mayor of Newark, mainly because of his early membership in Twitter and other social media platforms. .

He drew attention to causes such as homelessness and shortcomings in the federal food stamp program by doing hunger strikes and living temporarily in a tent, among other things that attract attention. Booker also regularly interacted with voters on Twitter. When someone tweeted that his elderly father needed help to shovel his driveway, Booker came forward to do it himself.

He also encountered a fire one day, saving the life of a woman suffering from smoke inhalation and burning himself.

Booker continued this approach in the Senate. At the height of Republican pressure for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, Booker drew attention to the debate by holding a sit-in on the Senate steps with others. Democrats and spreading the event for hours.

sometimes turned against us. At Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation hearings last fall, Booker threatened to reveal confidential documents dating back to Kavanaugh's time at the White House, though, as he l & # 39; 39, affirmed, "the penalty weighs on a reversal of the Senate". Booker called it his "Spartacus moment", but the drama was drastically alleviated when it became apparent that the documents in question had already been approved for public publication.

In the Senate, Booker was a staunch advocate of the overhaul of the criminal justice system. He was one of the first co-authors of the First Step Law, a bipartisan law passed in December that deals with drug conviction and the rehabilitation of prisoners released from prison. He was also one of the first senators to call for the legalization of marijuana.

Booker is an advocate for Medicare for all, raising the federal minimum wage to $ 15 by the hour and offering a job guarantee program. He is also a strong opponent of Trump's cabinet appointments.

While his great knowledge of traditional and social media was well worth it, Booker was also criticized by progressives for appearing too close to Wall Street and pharmaceutical companies, a major New Jersey industry.

And as a substitute for the Obama campaign in 2012, Booker accused Democratic critics of GOP candidate Mitt Romney's career of doing private equity business. "

In 2017, Booker told NPR that he had stopped receiving donations from the pharmaceutical industry, which was previously a major source of his campaign funds. co-sponsored a measure to legalize imports of pharmaceuticals from Canada, working with Senator Bernie Sanders, IV, and is increasingly voiced on high drug prices.