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Cory Booker is ending his bid for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, his campaign announced on Monday, January 13. The New Jersey Senator officially dropped out of the race due to his struggles with fundraising for the campaign and the lack of improvement in polling.
Booker failed to qualify for the two most recent Democratic debates because he failed to reach the polling requirements.
“Our campaign has reached the point where we need more money to scale up and continue building a campaign that can win — money we don’t have, and money that is harder to raise because I won’t be on the next debate stage and because the urgent business of impeachment will rightly be keeping me in Washington,” Booker said. “It’s with a full heart that I share this news—I’m suspending my campaign for president.
“I’ve said throughout this race that this election is not just a referendum on Donald Trump. It’s a referendum on who we are and who we must be to each other. And over the past year, I’ve seen the very best of who we can be. To my team, supporters, and everyone who gave me a shot—thank you. I am so proud of what we built, and I feel nothing but faith in what we can accomplish together.”
Booker was preaching a message of unity and love throughout the primary process, but it never fully resonated with the voters in what has already been an emotional and volatile campaign season.
With the attacks beginning to ramp up as the Iowa caucus approaches, Booker continued to fade into the background and was not grabbing the headlines that his fellow candidates were generating with their back-and-forths in the media and on the debate stage.
Now, Booker will go back to fully focusing on his job in Congress while also potentially finding himself among the leading candidates to earn a Vice President slot on the Democratic ticket.
