I started watching and listening to the Democratic candidates early in 2019, and haven’t stopped. This election is critical, and the Democrats need to get it right. Many of the candidates offer strengths, but Elizabeth Warren has emerged as a true leader. She has the qualifications, the personality, and the courage to tackle corruption, corporate greed and the injustices facing many Americans and institutions. Additionally, she is empathetic and can connect with people (voters and lawmakers from all sides); exhibits the energy of a 50-year-old; and possesses an uncanny intellect and a great sense of humor.
Elizabeth Warren started her career in national public service by proposing a simple, but powerful idea. Banks were selling extremely unsafe products: subprime mortgages so risky they caused one-in-five families to lose their homes. At the same time, every toaster — yes, the thing that makes toast — was tested for safety. If there was even a one percent chance of a toaster catching fire, it wouldn’t be allowed in stores. Warren said we needed a government agency looking out for the safety of financial products, saying if it’s good enough for toasters, it’s good enough for mortgages.
Warren took this idea to Washington and pitched the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The idea of it caused big bank executives to shake in their boots, but Warren persisted. She built a coalition of politicians, activists, and experts to bring the idea through an unfriendly administration and ultimately through Congress. The simple idea that mortgages should be as scrutinized as toasters became the first federal agency to advocate directly for consumers, and has returned over $12 billion to 29 million Americans.
I’m voting for Elizabeth because when she fights, she wins. If Elizabeth crafted a whole government agency as a private citizen, just imagine what she will do as president. By proposing ideas that are intelligent and creative — and by playing the inside game and outside game — she outmaneuvered hundreds of lobbyists, a popular incumbent Republican senator, and will beat Trump this November.
Thank you,
Allison Cutler
Middlebury