Politicos: Elizabeth Warren beer video all flat
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s livestreamed New Year’s Eve chat — featuring the former Harvard prof cracking and swigging a beer — is being widely panned as inauthentic pandering, with some political operatives calling it a desperate effort to compete with young contenders.
“It’s called ‘pulling a Beto,'” Democratic consultant Scott Ferson chuckled, referring to up-and-coming progressive Beto O’Rourke, a possible 2020 rival of Warren.
Younger candidates such as O’Rourke — who lost the Senate Texas race but won a national following on the left — and U.S. Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have made effective use of video on social media to raise their profiles in short order and become progressive darlings.
Warren became the first high-profile Democrat to take a formal step toward a 2020 race Monday when she announced her exploratory committee, first with a video promoting her progressive populist message in the morning, and then talking to reporters in the afternoon as her husband and golden retriever looked on. Later, as the final hours of 2018 ticked away, Warren fired up Instagram to speak directly to her fans in a livestream, pausing to grab a beer, and at one point doing some cooking.
But Ferson and others noted that the 69-year-old Warren has not been known for the down home, digital fireside chat approach, and it seemed contrived.
“She’s never really made this type of appeal,” GOP strategist Ryan Williams agreed. “She’s nervous about newer younger faces in the Democratic party. She’s making a pretty desperate attempt to make it look like she’s cool.”
“Elizabeth Warren seems more like a chardonnay senator than a beer senator,” quipped Tobe Berkovitz, a Boston University politics professor who was a longtime Democratic communications specialist. “It’s just sort of trying too hard … and people have pretty good radar for that sort of thing.”
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