Failed Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum (D) said on Wednesday that presidential candidate Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke (D) is only taken seriously after his 2018 loss because of his “set of privileges.”
“There’s no doubt that O’Rourke enjoys a set of privileges in his decision making that other candidates don’t,” Gillum told the New York Times. “Can you imagine it for any of the women that are in the race for president or considering a run? They probably could not muse out loud, or in the recesses of their mind have these sorts of conversations and then say them out loud, and think it would be taken seriously or they would be taken seriously.”
Many black and female Democrats have pointed out that liberal journalists, most of whom are white males, gushed over O’Rourke’s potential presidential candidacy even before he lost to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) while they downplayed the presidential prospects of Gillum and failed Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.
Abrams acknowledged this in a recent interview with the New York Times in which she said she was not ruling out a presidential run because she did not want black women to feel like Democrats are diminishing their achievements.
“I need women of color, particularly Black women, to understand that our achievements should not be diminished,” Abrams told the Times. “I’m not saying I would be the best candidate, but I’m not going to dismiss it out of hand the way others do.”
Gillum added that O’Rourke “also recognizes that there is privilege that accompanies him here.”
“That doesn’t make him less deserving of consideration, it’s just something that has to be acknowledged,” he continued. “I think over the course of this race, we will — and America will — discover what Beto O’Rourke’s views are. And I think he’ll be measured on that.”
After those on the left immediately slammed O’Rourke for his “white privilege,” O’Rourke has been acknowledging his “white privilege” and has vowed to make it a “big part” of his presidential campaign.
“As a white man who has had privileges that others could not depend on or take for granted, I’ve clearly had advantages over the course of my life,” O’Rourke said over the weekend. “I think recognizing that and understanding that others have not, doing everything I can to ensure that there is opportunity and the possibility for advancement and advantage for everyone is a big part of this campaign and a big part of the people who comprise this campaign.”
Instead of running for president, Gillum announced that he will be leading a voter registration drive to register nearly 1 million newly enfranchised felons in what Politico described will be “an effort to crush President Donald Trump’s reelection chances in the nation’s largest swing state.”