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Five things to know about Elizabeth Warren’s second term

Five things to know about Elizabeth Warren’s second term

“Her first term was more about building power, and her second term was more about having and using power,” she said Dan Geldon, a longtime Warren adviser.

Here are some of Warren’s notable policy moves during her final six years in office.

After Warren’s failed presidential bid, her influence in Washington grew significantly – primarily through people.

In February 2019, Warren joined the big fight of Democrats who want to run against former President Donald Trump in 2020 are calling for “major structural changes” and apparently Make a plan for everything. She did not place higher than third in any primary state she entered. including Massachusetts.

Although voters did not support her as party leader this year, her influence in Washington has grown enormously.

Warren’s influence does not come from a particular title or role. Rather, their belief that “pro“Sunny is politics” became a reality like many Warren’s Allies and protégés joined the Biden administration and other Democratic organizations. She advocated for ideologically aligned attitudes that are more inclined to support financial policies that benefit workers rather than companies, an area where she and Biden often saw eye-to-eye.

These people took positions in areas ranging from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which she helped establish, to positions in defense and climate policy. For example, Deb Haaland, the US Secretary of the Interior, was Warren’s co-chair Presidential campaign.

Her expanded network helped her directly and indirectly shape federal policy. In 2022, Ron Klain, then Biden’s chief of staff, will told the Globe Warren “really understands how to work the inside game, how to work with her colleagues on the Hill, how to work with us in the White House” and that they “take her recommendations very seriously.”

Warren has drawn criticism on some hot-button issues and broken with Massachusetts Democrats.

Warren has at times diverged from other Democrats in Massachusetts by: a another candidate for attorney general in 2022 for support Union efforts at the State House. She has also sometimes been criticized for her stance on pressing national issues such as border security and the conflict in the Middle East.

Warren disagreed any key Massachusetts Democrats, including Gov. Maura Healey, on the subject of immigrationwhere she has resisted cracking down on migrants entering the country. She criticized Biden for this Introduction of new asylum application restrictions in June and voted with most Republicans against a bipartisan immigration bill in February after it became clear it would not reach the 60 votes needed to advance.

She acknowledged that the refugee crisis has put pressure on Massachusetts, but would like to see future plans to provide more federal funding to states facing an immigration surge and create pathways to citizenship.

While Warren is considered a champion of progressive causes and has received some backlash from the left over her stance on the war in Israel and Gaza. Shortly after Israel’s Oct. 7 attack sparked a war in Gaza, hundreds of former aides launched their presidential campaign signed an open letter urges her to do so Call for a permanent ceasefire. She supported a temporarily in November.

Later she received criticism from some Jewish organizations because she said in April that she believed Israel’s war in Gaza would be legally considered a “genocide.” Her statement on the anniversary of the October 7 attacks was also very well received some resistance for his sharp criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Warren helped spearhead student debt relief efforts as part of a crusade to reshape Democrats’ approach to economic policy.

Early in her presidential run, Warren laid out a plan cancel around 640 billion US dollars in student loan debt. Years later, record levels of college debt relief – about $175 billion are among the outstanding achievements of the Biden administration so far.

Warren was one of the most vocal supporters They are calling on the government to address the problem by mobilizing union support and sharing borrowers’ stories with the president. In doing so, Warren has pushed her party to rethink its approach to economic policy – she has also held herself accountable for it 15 percent corporate minimum taxanother Campaign proposalthat was part of the Inflation Reduction Act 2022.

That doesn’t mean she always got her way. She has clashed with Biden appointees such as Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo about theirs Connections to Wall Street. And she supports some have caught fireincluding FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan, whose tenure has drawn criticism from many in the business community — and some Democrats — who say her tough stance goes beyond the agency’s purview. Khan’s critics That includes Harris allieslike billionaire Mark Cuban, who damn Warren “like everything that’s wrong in politics.”

Bharat Ramamurti, former deputy director at the National Economic Council under the Biden administration, who worked for Warren’s campaign, said her 2020 bid helped break news on issues such as… Taxation of the rich. Both her campaign and her office were often hotbeds of progressive ideas, he said.

“People realized that there was some push to address the problem clearly, to name the people who had caused the problem, and then talk about what they were going to do about it,” Ramamurti said. “The Democrats in particular did not have to take this defensive stance when it came to economic policy.”

Although clearly left-leaning, Warren has continued to push bipartisan policies that influenced niche issues.

Warren is viewed by many as a partisan; Across the country, she is often seen advocating for Democrats like Harris or on topics like access to abortion. She uses sharp rhetoric when it comes to core issues and is not afraid to let things go a cutting attack. But her supporters are quick to point out that she does too works with Republicans. Of the 19 bills she sponsored that became law during her second term, according to her officeeight had Republican co-sponsors.

Earlier this year she did worked with Senator Josh Hawley from Missouri, one of the most conservative senators, to amend the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act. The change allowed consumers to receive automatic refunds if an airline canceled or significantly delayed their flight.

And in 2021, she worked with Senator Steve Daines, who leads the Republican Senate’s campaign finance arm Lost and Found Retirement Savings Act. That measure, included in a 2022 Senate funding bill, was intended to help Americans track retirement benefits accumulated in various jobs or by companies that may have changed their names.

She does sometimes too worked with Senator JD Vance of OhioTrump’s vice president. The unlikely pair were united in a shared stance of anti-corporate populism, an area where Warren still occasionally differs from her Democratic colleagues.

While other Democrats have embraced new technologies, Warren remained skeptical.

Much of Warren’s work in the Senate focused on oversight. One area where it has found it difficult to garner more support for such an effort is technology, as it has long railed against Big Tech and has tried to do so Smash giants like Meta and Google.

Last year, she and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina sponsored a bill to create a new regulatory group tasked with “licensing and policing.” Technology company, an idea that hasn’t gained much traction yet Support. Warren has expressed concerns like artificial intelligence could be used in industry from medicine to journalism.

Warren has heavily criticized the cryptocurrency and questioned whether it would pose a threat to national security. That has sparked backlash both at home and in DC: Wealthy crypto investors have donated her Republican opponent, John Deaton, a Personal injury lawyer and cryptocurrency advocate. His campaign also received support from tech superstars including Elon Muskanother billionaire with who Warren had an argument.

Some colleagues in the Senate, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, have expressed greater interest in the industry. Several dozen Democrats voted to change SEC policies earlier this year could stop banks from holding digital assetsagainst Warren’s resistance. Both Harris and Trump spoke out an openness to new financial technologiesIt is unclear how her perspective would evolve in the next administration.


Anjali Huynh can be reached at [email protected].