Klobuchar Avoids Overt Pitch to Women While Warren Says ‘Women Win’

(Bloomberg) -- Drawing a contrast with Elizabeth Warren’s closing message that “women win,” Amy Klobuchar’s campaign manager said she will not focus on gender as the Iowa caucus nears.

Speaking at a Bloomberg News reporters roundtable in Des Moines, Campaign Manager Justin Buoen said the Minnesota senator remains focused on her policy, and not on her gender.

“Amy has never made gender the centerpiece of her campaigns, but she’s done historic things,” Buoen said. “She’s the first woman elected Hennepin County attorney, the first woman elected major statewide in Minnesota. She didn’t run on that. She ran on her plans, her ideas, and the way she’s going to govern.”

Klobuchar remains in the second tier of Democratic candidates, consistently polling behind the top four, but she’s recently seen gains in Iowa, which borders her home state of Minnesota.

In the closing days of the Iowa campaign, Warren has resisted questions about the electability of a woman candidate by pointing to successes in the 2018 midterms, arguing that “women win.”

Asked about the slogan, Buoen demurred. “We’ve been talking about how Amy just wins,” he said.

Buoen argued that Klobuchar has momentum, citing five recent polls which showed gains, the recent endorsements of the New York Times -- which co-endorsed Warren -- and the Quad City Times, and higher numbers of volunteers showing up at her campaign offices.

Klobuchar’s Iowa caucus director, Norm Sterzenbach, said that she remains in contention because many Iowa voters decide late and can change their minds if their candidate doesn’t reach a viability threshold at their caucus site. A recent Monmouth University poll of 544 likely caucus-goers found that 45% said they are still open to supporting a different candidate.

“Historically, Iowans make up their minds late,” he said.

But Klobuchar’s team played down a recent New York Times report that former Vice President Joe Biden’s team had floated the idea of an alliance in which their supporters would go to the other candidate in caucuses where they didn’t meet the threshold.

Buoen said that the pitch was “immediately laughed off by our team,” calling it “an informal, in-passing conversation between some old friends.” He said that Klobuchar intends to be viable throughout Iowa and has no plans to back another candidate if she is not.

“We’ve got no plans to not be viable in places and we’ve got no plans to tell our supporters what to do,” he said.

In the RealClearPolitics average of Iowa polls, Klobuchar is at 9%, behind the four front-runners but far ahead of the rest of the still-crowded field.

Her campaign is built around winning back the traditionally Democratic strongholds in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan that Donald Trump narrowly won in 2016.

To that end, Buoen said she has been campaigning in rural and suburban areas, especially areas that voted for Barack Obama and then Trump in the general election.

Klobuchar argues that her experience winning by wide margins in Minnesota shows that she can compete in the rural areas, especially in the Midwest.

She is one of six women who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination this year. Only three remain.

(Disclaimer: Michael Bloomberg is also seeking the Democratic presidential nomination. He is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News).

To contact the reporter on this story: Ryan Teague Beckwith in New York at rbeckwith3@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Max Berley, Craig Gordon

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