Bill Weld Looking to Challenge Trump in 2020
By Izzy Hessler 02/15/2019
Courtesy of Creative Commons
Bill Weld expressed interest in running for President in 2020 during a “Politics & Eggs” breakfast on Friday in New Hampshire. “Because of the many concerns I’ve talked about today, I’ve established an exploratory committee…as a Republican in the 2020 election.”
Several Democratic candidates have announced campaigns for the 2020 race, but Weld is the first potential challenger to President Trump in the Republican primary.
“The truth is that we’ve wasted an enormous amount of time by humoring this President, indulging him in his narcissism and his compulsive irrational behaviors,” Weld said Friday, expressing his distaste for the President’s culture of divisiveness in Washington.
“The situation is not yet hopeless, but we do need a mid-course correction,” he added.
Weld will face a tough race for the 2020 Republican nomination. In the past, presidents with inner-party approval ratings of 75 percent or above have not faced serious primary challenges. A Gallup poll recently showed that President Trump had an 89 percent national approval rating among Republicans.
Weld’s political past is unique in its bipartisanship. He served as a two-term governor for Massachusetts in the early 1990s before losing the 1996 U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts to John Kerry.
He resigned as governor in 1997 when President Bill Clinton nominated him as U.S. ambassador to Mexico, although he was blocked from a Senate nomination hearing.
Weld unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for New York Governor in 2005. He then worked alongside Mitt Romney in his campaign for president in 2008 before endorsing Democratic nominee Barack Obama after Romney dropped out of the race.
Weld was also Gary Johnson’s vice presidential nominee on the Libertarian Party ticket in 2016 but vouched for Hillary Clinton in her efforts to win the Democratic nomination.
Bill Weld’s political path presents some mixed messages, so it will be interesting to see what positions he takes on key issues come election season.