Barack Obama poised to add his star appeal to Joe Biden's campaign

The former president, the most popular politician in America with a huge social media following, can bolster the Democratic nominee with key groups and drive voter registration

Former president Barack Obama has dipped his toes into the 2020 presidential campaign recently and is positioned to do more in the coming months as Joe Biden’s effort to defeat Donald Trump gathers steam.

Interviews with about a dozen Democratic strategists, officials and people close to Obama indicated members of the party want the popular former president to use his powerful online presence and focus on rallying key Democrat constituencies that are critical to a Biden victory.

Obama is regarded as one of the most popular figures in American politics and a huge asset within the Democratic party. He left the White House with a near-60% approval rating. His endorsement for any candidate is the political campaign equivalent of an oilman and hitting a gusher.

Obama would be most effective, interviewees said, in highlighting his former vice-president’s résumé, rallying key Democratic groups like African American women, and pushing voters to register.

The situation is unique. There hasn’t been a popular former two-term president eager to hit the trail for his former running mate for years. On top of that, the coronavirus pandemic limits in-person campaigning and rallies. Still, the strategists interviewed say Obama is valuable and should be used everywhere.

“You rarely have a former president that is more popular than the now-sort-of-nominee,” Democratic pollster Cornell Belcher said. “Barack Obama is the most popular political figure in America right now.”

Valerie Jarrett, who served as a senior adviser to Obama during his time in the White House, said Obama is “committed to helping Vice-President Biden in any way the Biden campaign thinks is helpful. The pandemic is forcing everyone to be more creative since the conventional ways of doing business, including campaigning, are not possible.”

Obama has a robust social media presence with millions of Twitter followers, and Jarrett pointed to Obama’s endorsement of Biden, which took the form of an online video now that campaign rallies have become a thing of the pre-pandemic past.

“I think you can tell from the video that he rolled out with his endorsement, one very useful platform is President Obama’s social media platform where he has more followers than any other politician by far.”

According to a Democratic strategist familiar with Obama’s thinking, the former president is eager to campaign for Democrats “up and down the ballot” in 2020. He plans to follow the lead of the Biden campaign as well as that of the main Democratic campaign arms – the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and other umbrella organizations.

Obama was an active surrogate to boost Democrats in the 2018 midterm elections but since then has taken a more restrained approach to the national spotlight. He has only waded into current politics a few times and mostly on an indirect basis.

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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/23/barack-obama-joe-biden-campaign-trump