Marianne Williamson Back in Presidential Race

WASHINGTON — Marianne Williamson jumped back into the race for the Democratic presidential nomination on Wednesday, fresh off her surprising third-place finish in the party’s primary in Michigan.

Voters in the Great Lakes State went to the polls on Tuesday to vote in both Democratic and Republican primaries.

In the Democratic race, President Joe Biden crushed the competition pulling in 81.1% of the vote and garnering 115 of the state’s delegates in the process. 

Uncommitted, a protest vote from the state’s large Muslim community over Biden’s policies toward Gaza, came in second, with 13.3%.

But Williamson, who suspended her campaign after the Nevada Democratic primary earlier this month, got 3% of the vote, besting Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Minn., who is still actively campaigning by .3 percentage points.

Williamson has hovered in the low single digits throughout the presidential race, getting 4% of the vote in New Hampshire (a primary not recognized by the Democratic National Committee), 3% in Nevada and 2.15% in South Carolina.

But on Wednesday she told supporters she felt compelled to reenter the race because of political dynamics she finds increasingly disturbing.

“Donald Trump’s power is on the incline, and President Biden’s is on the decline,” she said in an email to supporters.

“More and more people are saying the quiet part out loud: that despite the fact that the president deserves credit for many of his accomplishments, he is clearly a weak candidate to defeat Donald Trump in 2024,” she said.

In the email and an accompanying video, Williamson went on to explain that she suspended her campaign three weeks ago because she was losing “the horse race.”

“But there is something much bigger than the horse race that’s at stake here. In the words of Mohammed Ali, ‘When the mission is right, the odds don’t matter,’” she said.

“We cannot sit idly by while the D.C. political class sleepwalks this country into disaster,” she said.

“Even if the most I can do is influence the president, that in itself is a goal worth striving for. I hope that you will help me,” she said.

In her video, Williamson expanded on both her concerns and the alternative, optimistic vision she hopes to inject into the race.

She described Trump, the likely Republican nominee, as “a fascist standing at the door,” and said she’s worried about Biden’s “let’s finish the job messaging.”

“My question is, what is he offering the millions of voters who can’t survive without working two or three jobs?” Williamson said. “A solid 20% of us are doing well [under Biden] and that should be celebrated. But they are surrounded by a vast sea of economic despair.

“Thirty-nine percent of the American people are regularly skipping meals in order to pay their rent, and over half of all personal bankruptcies are caused by excessive medical debt,” she continued. “We are living in a time when economic anxiety is experienced by the majority of people … people who are living paycheck to paycheck … and at the same time, we’re also living at a time of increasing militarism.”

Williamson placed blame for these woes on “We the people” not “owning” the country at the moment.

“Abraham Lincoln said the people who died in the Civil War had died so that a government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish from the earth,” she said. “Well, it’s perishing now, on our watch. 

“We are a government, for all intents and purposes, of the corporations, by the corporations and for the corporations. And we need a president who says this. We need a president who lays down an agenda and says we’re going to turn this thing around. And we need a president who inspires the American people and helps them believe that we can do better,” WIlliamson continued.

“That’s what it will take to make this country great again — a return to a time when we actually had a thriving middle class, and you don’t do that with Trump’s policies,” she said.

Williamson’s policies, policies she’s vowing to tout as much as possible ahead of the California primary on Super Tuesday, are definitely left of center.

She espouses Medicare for All, free college and technical school training, the elimination of all college debt, paid family leave and subsidized child care.

“We need a peace academy as well as a military academy. We need to end America’s war on drugs. And we have to have a ceasefire in Gaza,” she said.

“And we need a vision that will defeat Trump, not ‘let us finish the job,” she continued. “What we’re watching now is a car crash in slow motion. Everybody knows that.”

Williamson acknowledged that many people think she’s “delusional.”

“I’ll tell you what’s delusional. What’s delusional is just closing our eyes and crossing our fingers and just hoping that somehow Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will be able to beat the Trump juggernaut and its dark, dark vision. 

“We are going to defeat that juggernaut by lifting people, by reminding people that new beginnings are what America specializes in. We need to remember what our ancestors have done when they were challenged. We’ve done great things in this country. We’re hardwired to do great things,” Williamson said.

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