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Julián Castro and Rep. Gabbard Announce 2020 Presidential Bids

HeadlineJan 14, 2019

And two more high-profile Democrats have announced their bid for the 2020 presidential election. Julián Castro, former San Antonio mayor and housing secretary under President Obama, officially announced his run Saturday, one month after he launched a presidential exploratory committee. His first event as a presidential contender will be in Puerto Rico. Meanwhile, Hawaii Congressmember Tulsi Gabbard, the first Hindu elected to Congress, has also said she will run, with a formal announcement expected this week. The Iraq War veteran has come under scrutiny since the news broke, with some pointing to statements about LGBTQ rights early in her political career, including once referring to advocates of marriage equality as “homosexual extremists.” Her ties to the nationalist prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, and to the ruling BJP have also come under scrutiny. In 2016, she quit as DNC vice chair and threw her support behind Senator Bernie Sanders’s run for president, after objecting to the DNC’s apparent favoring of Hillary Clinton’s candidacy. More recently, she was one of three Democratic congressmembers to oppose the new PAYGO rule, which requires Congress to offset any new spending with either tax increases or budget cuts.

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