Peter Hasson, DCNF
- Michael Avenatti, lawyer for porn star Stormy Daniels, is exploring a 2020 presidential campaign.
- Liberals are warming up to the idea of an Avenatti candidacy.
- Avenatti is pushing other potential 2020 candidates to move further and further left.
Michael Avenatti might have a shot.
Avenatti, the lawyer for porn star Stormy Daniels, is publicly exploring a challenge to President Donald Trump in 2020 and despite his lack of political experience, the left is taking him seriously.
“He is really, truly, honest-to-God running for president. And I think he could win,” Vox’s Dylan Matthews wrote in a Friday blog post.
Rank-and-file Democrats are “mad because Trump is president, he keeps being president despite being a petulant, corrupt child, and that’s infuriating. There’s a huge demand for a candidate who gets that raw emotion on an instinctual level,” Matthews explained. “Avenatti is that candidate.”
Avenatti is acting the part of the presidential candidate as well, visiting local Democrats in key primary states like Iowa and New Hampshire and launching a political action committee.
New York Magazine’s Eric Levitz argued in a Tuesday column that “there’s a reasonable case that Michael Avenatti’s misguided entrance into presidential politics could actually do more good than harm — assuming, of course, that he doesn’t actually win.”
Others aren’t so sure Avenatti’s candidacy will help Democrats.
“Even if Avenatti has little chance of winning the nomination, he could still wreck the 2020 Democratic race,” wrote Politico Magazine’s Bill Scher in a Friday piece titled “Michael Avenatti Is Winning the 2020 Democratic Primary.”
“In fact he’s already doing it, by using his considerable media skills and political instincts to frame the contest around how far Democrats should go when wielding power, and to pressure his rivals to follow his cue.”
The pugnacious attorney is putting pressure on other potential Democratic candidates to move further and further to the left.
Avenatti has called on Democrats to support expanding the Supreme Court to 11 seats, in order to ensure a liberal majority. The Democratic “nominee must commit to this or not receive the nomination,” Avenatti wrote on Twitter.
In addition to his lack of political experience, Avenatti’s personal baggage could present a problem for Democrats as well.
Avenatti sparked a backlash in May after threatening to sue The Daily Caller News Foundation for reporting on issues in his personal background.
Avenatti’s business partners have accused him of skipping out on payments and committing fraud.
One of those companies was sued for sex discrimination after allegedly firing a woman for becoming pregnant. Despite a court ordering Avenatti’s company to pay the woman a $126,000 settlement, she says she has yet to receive a cent.
Avenatti did not return TheDCNF’s request for comment for this article.
Follow Hasson on Twitter @PeterJHasson
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