As the 2020 Democratic primary process picks up steam, most of the candidates are practically tripping over each other with increasingly socialistic policy proposals.
While this pleases the far left, it may not be the best way to attract moderate voters who are tired of ideological extremism — and who make up the majority. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is quietly rooting for a “moderate” candidate to emerge victorious from the party’s primary season, according to ABC’s “The View” co-host Joy Behar.
Behar: Pelosi wants “moderate” Biden as nominee
Behar shared her take on Pelosi’s thinking on Tuesday’s program when she revealed that the pair had met up with each other recently at a cocktail party, Fox News reported.
The party occurred at an unspecified time during an off-season break in filming for The View, and Behar shared a picture of herself and Pelosi together at the gathering.
Behar further reported that, in her view, Pelosi was all-in on supporting a “moderate” candidate — such as former Vice President Joe Biden — as the best nominee to take on President Donald Trump in 2020.
“I infer that she believes that a moderate has a better chance of beating him than the more radical candidates,” Behar said.
She added that Pelosi “pointed out that in the midterms, it’s the moderates who beat the Republicans in those Trump states.”
Biden as a “moderate”
With respect to the 2018 midterm elections, there is some truth to the assertion that a significant portion of Democratic gains in the House came by way of relatively moderate candidates defeating Republicans in states that Trump had won, even as the more outspoken leftist candidates like the members of the “squad” — who ran in solidly blue districts with little chance of losing — received the overwhelming majority of media attention.
As for the notion that Biden is a “moderate?” It’s all relative to his opponents.
In comparison to candidates like Sens. Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and Kamala Harris, Biden is less radical on issues like Medicare for All. He has said he would instead expand and fix the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare.
However, Biden has already made a leftward shift on issues such as stricter gun control, climate change, returning to globalist trade policies, raising taxes on the wealthy and middle class, and a number of other topics.
Behar and Pelosi may believe that Biden is a “moderate,” and in comparison to Harris, Sanders, and Warren, they may be correct. But in comparison to President Trump, and in the eyes of the vast centrist middle of the country, he is a leftist whose policies will harm the country just as much as the others.