Donald Trump Mocks Beto O'Rourke's 2020 Hopes: 'I Thought You Were Supposed to Win Before You Run for President'
President Donald Trump threw a barb at outgoing Representative Beto O'Rourke on Friday—poking at the fact that last month the Texas Democrat lost his Senate bid to incumbent Senator Ted Cruz.
Despite his loss to Cruz, O'Rourke has been floated as a potential 2020 presidential candidate because of the energy his campaign inspired in the red state of Texas.
"Now he's running for president. I thought you were supposed to win before you run for president," Trump said, referring to O'Rourke while praising Cruz at a bill signing on Friday.
Trump on Beto O'Rourke:
— Zeke Miller (@ZekeJMiller) December 21, 2018
"I thought you were supposed to win before you run for president."
Pool: At bill-signing event, Trump congratulated Cruz on re-election and opined on Beto 2020 buzz. "I thought you were supposed to win before you run for president," Trump said.
— Patrick Svitek (@PatrickSvitek) December 21, 2018
O'Rourke, of course, has won elections. He was elected to the House in 2012, winning re-election twice, and won the Democratic primary to face off with Cruz in November's midterms. Trump had never won an election before winning the Republican presidential primary in 2016. He had explored seeking the Reform Party presidential nomination in 2000 but ultimately backed out.
O'Rourke has not yet announced whether he'll run in 2020. He has, however, laid out a strategy from beating the president.
"Whoever is running [against Trump] may very well be running against somebody who has not the slightest respect for our norms, traditions, institutions, civility, dignity, decency in public life," O'Rourke said at a town-hall meeting last week. "This is the test, this is the mother of all tests for this democracy—whether we can run a campaign and have candidates at all levels from school board to the White House who are willing to focus on issues, on our potential, on our future, instead of our fears, instead of attacking one another personally and going for base impulses."
O'Rourke is polling relatively well among Democratic voters. A CNN poll this month indicated that former Vice President Joe Biden garnered 30 percent support to lead the way among potential Democratic 2020 candidates. Behind him was Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders at 13 percent, while O'Rourke stood at 9 percent, ahead of more established figures like Senators Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker.
