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Steyer copies Trump

By Staff | Jul 13, 2019

Let us know if you have seen this once already.

A self-made billionaire who has never previously sought political office decides to run for president. He shows up talking about corporations are ripping people off and rigging the political system.

The last person who did that was Donald J. Trump.

Now, San Francisco billionaire Tom Steyer is using a similar message in his effort to win the Democratic presidential nomination.

“If this is a banana republic with a few very rich people and everybody else is living in misery, that’s a failure,” Steyer said during his Tuesday campaign announcement.

“Americans are deeply disappointed and hurt by the way they’re treated by what they think is the power elite in Washington, D.C. – and that goes across party lines and it goes across geography. We’ve got to take the corporate control out of our politics,” Steyer continued.

Steyer said he plans to spend $100 million in an effort to win the Democratic nomination. That $100 million will fund plenty of campaign ads, field organizers and communications staffers.

Steyer wasted no time getting on the air, either. By Wednesday morning, his commercials were running on New Hampshire cable TV.

Though he has never before sought office himself, Steyer is no stranger to politics. He has donated millions to Democrats in an effort to end the extraction and use of fossil fuels, such as coal, oil and natural gas. He also started an online petition drive to impeach Trump.

It will be quite interesting to see how Steyer performs as a Democratic candidate. He certainly fits with Democrats on issues such as abortion, LGBTQ matters and environmentalism.

However, two candidates who are currently near the top of the Democratic polls – Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont – regularly decry “billionaires.”

“I am a bit tired of seeing billionaires trying to buy political power,” Sanders stated via Twitter after Steyer announced his candidacy.

“The Democratic primary should not be decided by billionaires, whether they’re funding Super PACs or funding themselves. The strongest Democratic nominee in the general will have a coalition that’s powered by a grassroots movement,” Warren added on Twitter.

Will Democratic voters be impressed by Steyer? We are not sure.

Steyer is a 62-year-old white man who is billionaire. Those demographics are unlikely to excite the base of today’s Democratic Party.

On the other hand, $100 million worth of campaigning may allow Steyer to simply overwhelm the opposition when it comes to name recognition and messaging.

Either way, his candidacy adds to the intrigue of the already zany Democratic primary.

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