President Obama has been involved in an open spat with left-wing Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren over her opposition to his fast-track trade deal. But a senator from Ohio is saying that Obama’s criticism of Warren is based in part on “sexism.”
Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown recently claimed that sexism plays a part in Obama’s blithe dismissal of Warren’s opposition. He further said that Obama’s comments about Warren are “disrespectful.”
“I think by just calling her ‘another politician,'” Brown said on Tuesday after the president’s trade deal suffered a defeat in the Senate. “I’m not going to get into more details. I think referring to her as first name, when he might not have done that for a male senator, perhaps?
Understanding that his charge was a firebomb, Brown quickly added, “I’ve said enough.”
Then he added, “I think that the president has made this more personal than he needed to.”
Obama has taken several swipes at Warren over the last few weeks: They’ve been at loggerheads over the president’s trade deal.
In an interview with Yahoo! News last week, Obama said Warren was “absolutely wrong” on the trade deal and dismissed her criticism saying, “The truth of the matter is that Elizabeth is, you know, a politician like everybody else.”
But all Obama’s defiance and dismissive treatment of Warren didn’t do him much good as on Tuesday afternoon as the Senate delivered a stinging defeat to the President. The upper chamber voted not to end a filibuster of Obama’s trade deal. The final vote showed every Senate Democrat voting against the President’s interests but one: Delaware’s Tom Carper.
Unions and Democrats are almost united against Obama’s trade deal and Warren is leading the charge against him.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter: @warnerthuston. Email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.