Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) suspended his presidential campaign this week after failing to gain much momentum in the race against incumbent President Joe Biden, leaving CNN’s Jake Tapper to ask, “Was it worth it?”
“I mean, I don’t need to tell you, you burned a lot of bridges,” Tapper said. “You’re giving up a safe Democratic congressional seat, perhaps giving up a future in politics. I mean, would you do it again?”
Phillips, at 55, ran as a “younger alternative” to 81-year-old Biden. In the end, though, Phillips endorsed Biden, acknowledging, “It is clear the alternative is not me.” He described his run as “a mission of principle” and acknowledged that it was both “joyful and painful.”
“I would do it 1,000 times again,” he said, continuing:
If I inspire just a couple of people in our country to not be quiet and not stay in line when you feel compelled to represent something — and by the way, I do — I felt very disappointed in a lot of colleagues who had been saying, quietly, the same things that a lot of the country was saying publicly. And I want to create, maybe reform, a culture here in Washington, Jake, in which people feel liberated to speak their truth and are not punished for it, rather celebrated for it, because we have a crisis of participation. We have a crisis of truth. And I thought it was important that someone say the quiet part out loud. I did.
Tapper pointed to what some of Phillips’ critics had said.
“I’ve heard a lot of really nasty stuff about you from your Democratic colleagues. I mean, just like, ‘What is he thinking? Exercise in narcissism.’”
Phillips responded, “If someone thinks this was a selfish endeavor, let me tell you, this is not the way to accomplish an ego trip. Just the opposite. I know, I know I burned bridges, but that’s the problem with Washington, Jake, is that the people who express that sentiment are so disconnected from what’s actually happening in our country right now.”
Phillips spent $5 million of his own money on his campaign. He has said that he’s done with politics and won’t seek reelection to the House.
Watch the clip above via CNN.
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