Elizabeth Warren stops being polite and starts getting real: "Let’s be honest - Donald Trump is a loser"

After Trump told the New York Times that Warren's "whole life was based on a fraud,” the senator came out swinging

By Sophia Tesfaye

Senior Politics Editor

Published March 21, 2016 7:11PM (EDT)

Elizabeth Warren   (Reuters/Jonathan Ernst)
Elizabeth Warren (Reuters/Jonathan Ernst)

Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren has taken a lot of flak recently for failing to throw her support behind either Democratic presidential candidate (let's be honest -- behind Bernie Sanders) and while she's acknowledged that both abstaining from her own White House run and refusing to support any particular campaign has left some of her progressive supporters disappointed, she's absolutely no longer reticent to comment on the ridiculousness that is the Republican presidential primary.

"I take Donald Trump very seriously," Warren told MSNBC's Chris Hayes last week, calling on Americans to unite in opposition to Trump's candidacy. "What he is promoting is a form of hate that is virulent, and that is bad for this country. And my view on this is, this is it. It is time for all of us to speak out -- Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Libertarians, vegetarians -- everybody, to say no to The Donald."

Warren's criticism of Trump has gotten louder and more forceful as his campaign has gained steamed and grown more violent. Earlier this month, Warren took former Massachusetts governor and failed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney to task for failing to speak out against Trump sooner. “Where was Mitt Romney for the last eight years? I’m sorry, where was Mitt Romney since he ran for president?” Warren asked, arguing that Republicans' reflexive opposition to President Obama “is the kind of extremism that has nursed and nurtured Donald Trump."

And at a St. Patrick's Day event in Boston over the weekend, Warren ridiculed the speculation that Trump may select Massachusetts' last Republican senator, Scott Brown, who she defeated in 2012, as a potential running mate. “It would be the perfect reality show matchup,” Warren told the crowd. “‘Celebrity Apprentice’ meets ‘The Biggest Loser.’”

Responding to Warren's comments in an interview with the New York Times' Maureen Dowd, the Republican frontrunner ruthlessly attacked Warren, evoking the conservative non-controversy around Warren's heritage and mangling the facts in the process:

I think it’s wonderful because the Indians can now partake in the future of the country. She’s got about as much Indian blood as I have. Her whole life was based on a fraud. She got into Harvard and all that because she said she was a minority.

Warren, of course, was a faculty member at Harvard, not a student. Warren received her undergraduate degree from the University of Houston and her law degree from Rutgers School of Law-Newark.

On Monday, Warren took to Twitter to throughly blast Trump. Warren called Trump a "loser", saying he's "cheated people" and that he "stands ready to tear apart an America that was built on values like decency, community, and concern for our neighbors."

Several tweets later, Warren concluded that "Many of history’s worst authoritarians started out as losers – and Trump is a serious threat. The way I see it, it’s our job to make sure he ends this campaign every bit the loser that he started it":

Warren expounded on her anti-Trump tirade on Facebook:

Let’s be honest – Donald Trump is a loser. Count all his failed businesses. See how he kept his father’s empire afloat...

Posted by Elizabeth Warren on Monday, March 21, 2016


By Sophia Tesfaye

Sophia Tesfaye is Salon's senior editor for news and politics, and resides in Washington, D.C. You can find her on Twitter at @SophiaTesfaye.

MORE FROM Sophia Tesfaye


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