Texas Democrat, who has drawn comparisons to Obama, tells supporters his campaign ‘seeks to unite a very divided country’

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Beto O’Rourke, the former congressman who narrowly lost to Ted Cruz in the 2018 Texas Senate race, has announced he will seek the Democratic nomination for president.

Ending months of speculation over his plans, O’Rourke threw his hat into a crowded primary field vying for the party’s blessing to challenge Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

O'Rourke enters race with natural skills, eager support and some big challenges Read more

O’Rourke, 46, rose to national prominence during the 2018 midterms, when his bid to unseat Cruz garnered unprecedented grassroots support and a historic fundraising haul.

Although he fell short, O’Rourke outperformed expectations for any Democrat in the deeply conservative state of Texas, falling less than three percentage points behind Cruz, the Republican incumbent.

Despite his defeat, O’Rourke swiftly emerged as a top Democratic presidential contender, drawing comparisons to Barack Obama for his charisma and hopeful message.

“This is going to be a positive campaign that seeks to bring out the very best from every single one of us, that seeks to unite a very divided country,” O’Rourke said in a video announcement posted on Thursday morning. “We saw the power of this in Texas.”

O’Rourke stated his intention in the video to “travel this country and listen to those I seek to serve”. He said he will then return to El Paso on 30 March for a campaign kickoff and invited would-be supporters “to the greatest grassroots campaign this country has ever seen”.

Quick guide Who are the leading Democrats running for 2020? Show Hide Joe Biden, former vice president Biden unsuccessfully ran for the nomination in 1988 and 2008, and his campaign is likely to be dogged by controversy after allegations from several women they were left feeling uncomfortable by their physical interactions with him. If successful, Biden would become the oldest person to be elected president in US history. Mike Bloomberg, former New York mayor Bloomberg has expressed concern that none of the top candidates can defeat Trump, and he aims to make up for an unusually late entry in the Democratic primary with historic spending of hundreds of millions of dollars in television ad time and an unorthodox strategy of skipping the first four states in the primary. Bloomberg has announced that his campaign will be entirely self-funded, but can this billionaire win? Amy Klobuchar, Minnesota senator On Election Night 2018, Klobuchar coasted to a third term as senator in a state Trump almost won. Next morning she was on every short list of potential presidential candidates. Supporters say her success with rural voters makes her a formidable candidate in the Rust Belt, while her calm demeanour provides a clear contrast with Trump. Bernie Sanders, Vermont senator Sanders turned a long-shot, anti-establishment bid for the presidency into a “political revolution” that energized the party’s progressive base. His political career began nearly 40 years ago, but it wasn’t until his 2016 run that Sanders became a national figure as a new generation of Democrats – and 2020 contenders – embraced his populist economic policies. Elizabeth Warren, Massachusetts senator Her sharp criticism of Wall Street and big corporations has made Warren a favorite among progressive activists, and she will campaign on a message of a rigged economic system and income inequality.

O’Rourke has joined what is shaping up to be a diverse Democratic field that includes senators Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker, Amy Klobuchar, and Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard. O’Rourke will also be up against fellow Texas native Julian Castro, the former mayor of San Antonio and housing secretary under Obama who launched his own presidential campaign in January.

A onetime guitarist for an El Paso punk band called Foss, prior to his Senate bid, O’Rourke had kept a relatively low profile as a three-term congressman with little name recognition.

But as his upstart campaign to defeat Cruz gained steam, O’Rourke transformed into an overnight celebrity who earned the approval of public figures ranging from Beyoncé to LeBron James. He went on to amass a record-breaking $38m in the third quarter of his race against Cruz, in what will likely mark a major fundraising advantage over the other Democratic contenders.

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Donald Trump, in tweets, has called O’Rourke a “flake” and a “total lightweight” who “will never be allowed to turn Texas into Venezuela!”.

The president has also mocked O’Rourke’s nickname, calling him “a stone-cold phony named Robert Francis O’Rourke, sometimes referred to as Beto,” during a stump speech for Cruz during the midterms.

“He pretends to be a moderate,” Trump continued, “but he’s actually a radical open-borders left-winger”. On the left, some have in fact labeled O’Rourke a moderate who has yet to prove his progressive bona fides .

In separate remarks to reporters that same day, Trump also called O’Rourke “highly overrated”.

“When I heard about him, I figured he must be something a little special. He’s not,” Trump said.

O’Rourke has the backing of a network of advocates who have independently been campaigning for him to run. The Draft Beto organisation has already mobilised thousands of grassroots volunteers, many on college campuses, and held 30 house parties in nine states.

Who's running in 2020? The full list of Democrats vying to take on Trump Read more

Its co-founder Nate Lerner told the Guardian: “Now the real work begins. We’re shifting the grassroots, financial, and political resources we’ve built over to Beto’s campaign and focusing entirely on electing Beto in 2020.”

For all the buzz about his charisma, grassroots appeal and dedication to campaigning for every last vote, O’Rourke does not have a substantial track record in Washington for legislation or making his voice heard on domestic and foreign policy.

And his voting record in the Capitol showed, according to analysis published last year, that even as O’Rourke represented one of the most solidly Democratic congressional districts in the United States, he has on several occasions broken with the majority of House Democrats and voted in line with the Trump administration.

Meanwhile, Republican opposition campaigning ahead of O’Rourke’s swing through Iowa this week is focused on portraying him as a product of white wealth and privilege, and is “no Obama”, who overcame significant struggles to reach the top.