Elizabeth Ann Warren has served since 2013 as a U.S. senator from Massachusetts. A member of the Democratic Party and a former Harvard Law School professor, Warren is a firm progressive who routinely takes far-left, populist-inspired political stances on policies pertaining to the economy and the regulatory state. Warren, who has a checkered and controversial past with respect to her alleged — but scientifically dubious — Cherokee ancestry, was born in Oklahoma City and grew up in Oklahoma. She attended George Washington University before attaining a bachelor’s degree at the University of Houston. She went to law school at Rutgers University.
Warren’s first marriage ended in divorce, and she is now married to Bruce Mann, who is also a Harvard Law School professor. Warren has two children.
Warren’s debatable claim to partial Cherokee ancestry has been the source of much drama and partisan bickering. In late 2018, Warren released the results of a DNA test that showed she might be as little as 1/1024th Cherokee. She was subsequently criticized by the Cherokee Nation.
Warren’s far-left economic and social stances, which were somewhat avant-garde at the time of her election to the U.S. Senate, are now mainstream for the Democratic Party. Prior to her election to the Senate, Warren was instrumental in the development and founding of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), which was created by the 2010 Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. Conservatives have routinely assailed the CFPB as being unnecessarily intrusive, unconstitutionally funded, and unconstitutionally structured.
She is now running for the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential nomination and has recently polled in third place, behind only former Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT).
Electoral History: Warren first sought political office in 2012. She defeated incumbent Senator Scott Brown (R-MA), who had previously won a special election in 2010 after the death of decades-long leftist icon Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA). She was easily re-elected in 2018.
On The Issues: Warren is a hard-left progressive who often takes the most left-wing stance possible on any given legal or public policy issue. Similar to Bernie Sanders, Warren is well known for her populist “class warfare”-style rhetoric that rhetorically and substantively pits the working and middle classes against the wealthy. She has generally supported anti-capitalistic and anti-growth economic policies, heavy-handed government regulation over the private economy, robust labor unions, and the Nordic model of a sprawling welfare state. Along with Sanders, Warren’s views on economics and the proper size and scope of government place her firmly on the leftward flank of the 2020 Democratic Party presidential candidate field.
Constitution: Warren, a former law professor who specialized in bankruptcy law, is a legal progressive — in the mold of FDR-era “New Deal” jurists — who believes that the Constitution grants the federal government broad powers to regulate the economy. Like many leftists, she takes a hard line on antitrust enforcement. Warren has been heralded by the Left as the brainchild of the CFPB, which conservatives have consistently criticized on grounds of general regulatory heavy-handedness, its “independent” funding by the Federal Reserve instead of by congressional appropriation, and its only dubiously constitutional governing structure. She is strongly critical of the free speech-affirming 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Citizens United v. F.E.C. Warren has called for eradicating the Electoral College.
Economy: Warren’s economic views likely place her to the left of every 2020 Democratic presidential candidate outside of Bernie Sanders himself. She is a Keynesian who supports higher spending, the purported “benefits” of deficit spending, higher taxation (especially on wealthier Americans), mass redistribution via expansive Nordic-style welfare state programs, and a broader governmental role in infrastructure spending. As part of her 2020 campaign, Warren has proposed a wealth tax (of only arguable constitutionality) that would impose a 2% annual tax on household net worths above $50 million and a 3% annual tax on net household worths above $1 billion. Warren has proposed an elaborate student loan forgiveness plan as part of her 2020 campaign, although critics allege that most of the benefits of the plan accrue to the wealthy.
Health Care: Warren, who has long been a supporter of Obamacare, now campaigns in support of a single-payer/”Medicare for All” health insurance system. She has described health care as a “basic human right.” She routinely speaks in populist terms against the purported greed of health insurance companies.
Immigration: Warren supports the DREAM Act and routinely supports other amnesty/pro-illegal immigration policies that would magnetize America’s southern border and incentivize dangerous cartels and human trafficking rings to transport Central American migrants up through Mexico. She has frequently been a fierce critic of the Trump administration’s border security initiatives, although she was silent as the Obama administration pursued many similar detention facility-centric policies for prospective asylum seekers.
Foreign Policy: Throughout her Senate career, Warren has consistently advanced a leftist foreign policy that is relatively soft on America’s major geopolitical foes and relatively harsh on America’s major geopolitical allies. She supports a “two-state solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and has often been critical of Israel’s need to robustly defend itself amid a sea of existential enemies surrounding it. Warren has disingenuously implied that congresswoman Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) has merely engaged in criticism of Israel’s present government, rather than also engaging in overt anti-Semitism. She has opposed anti-BDS legislation. She has supported arms control initiatives, especially with Russia. Warren supported President Obama’s Iran nuclear deal and opposed President Trump’s exiting the U.S. from the deal. She consistently supports a stronger congressional role in the conduct of foreign policy and militarism overseas.
Abortion: Warren is adamantly pro-abortion and believes strongly that Roe v. Wade was correctly decided.
Guns: Warren has frequently supported gun control policies that would infringe upon Americans’ Second American rights. She supports expanded background checks, limitations or bans on certain weapons and magazines that are currently in wide distribution, and supports controversial “red flag” gun legislation. Warren supports a ban on the undefinable sub-class of firearms referred to as so-called “assault weapons” — a line of thought that, if taken to its logical conclusion, could lead to the banning of all semi-automatic firearms in America.