Elizabeth Warren explores presidential run: Middle class 'under attack'

Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren announced Monday she is exploring a run for president in 2020, the first big-name Democrat to do so.

In a YouTube video, Warren said she's launching an exploratory committee for 2020 and plans to fight for the middle class. She filed paperwork with the Federal Elections Commission that allows her to raise money for her campaign.

"If we organize together, if we fight together, if we persist together, we can win. We can win and we will," Warren said. "Corruption is poisoning our democracy. Our government is supposed to work for all of us, but instead, it has become a tool for the wealthy and well-connected."

Warren will be sworn in for her second Senate term in January after winning 60 percent of the vote in November.

In her video Monday, the Oklahoma native talked about her brothers serving in the military, her father having a heart attack and her mother taking a minimum wage job at Sears that saved their house. Her father worked as a janitor. Warren worked as a public school teacher and a law professor before becoming a senator.

"America's middle class is under attack," she said. "I left the classroom to go to Washington and confront the broken system head-on. I never thought I'd run for office -- not in a million years."

She said too many minorities slip through the cracks and fall into traps because of decades of discrimination. In her video, Warren said she wants to create opportunities for all Americans.

The Republican National Committee was quick to seize on the news, calling Warren "out of touch."

"Now that she is formally running, Americans will see her for what she is: another far-left obstructionist and a total fraud," RNC chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel said. "Voters know President Trump's agenda gets results and they will make their voices heard at the ballot box in 2020."

President Donald Trump has repeatedly called Warren "Pocohontas," mocking her Native American heritage. Warren released a DNA test showing "strong evidence" she has some native blood going back six to 10 generations.

"This is just who I am," she told NBC News in November. "I put out 10 years of my tax returns. I've put out all my employment records. Year, I've even taken a DNA test. I'm an open book."

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