If there’s anyone former Obama officials hate more than President Obama, it’s Starbucks founder Howard Schultz, who shocked the political world this week with news he plans to run for president in 2020.
Schultz, a self-made billionaire and one of the most prominent progressive CEOs in America, is rankling Democrats after saying he plans to run as an Independent.
Former officials with the Obama Administration are outright panicking at the prospect.
President Obama’s deputy chief of staff, Jim Messina, said Schultz is going to “ruin the world”:
Former Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau said Schultz running as an Independent is a “f*cking awful thing to do”:
When Schultz told CBS This Morning that his big idea is “To unite the country, for us to come together, to do everything we can to realize that the promise of America is for everyone,” former Obama National Security Council spokesman, Tommy Vietor, flippantly replied: “This is some warmed-over vapid bullshit.”
Similarly, Obama’s former deputy national security adviser, Ben Rhodes, mocked Schultz’s announcement: “Area billionaire thinks he will connect with Ordinary American People by reciting warmed over consultant edited pablum version of what he says to other billionaires at shared vacation destinations.”
Dan Pfeiffer raged that the “average American” knows “exponentially more about coffee than Howard Schultz knows about running for president”:
Pfeiffer also suggested this is all a Schultz plot to make money on his new book:
Finally, Pfeiffer described the possibility of a Schultz run an “existential threat” to Democrats:
Former Obama speechwriter Jon Lovett wrote an open letter to Schultz in which he advised him to “get your head out of your ass” and quit the race:
You want to help your country? Help us defeat the propaganda machine that enables Trump and the worst elements of the Republican Party. Help us push back against corporate interests arrayed against action on climate change. Fund local journalism. Fund scholarships. Fund voter registration and protection. And, if you believe in the case you’d make as an independent candidate, join the Democratic primary and make that case before the voters you’d need to win. Put some skin in the game. Put some time on the trail. Because unlike money, time and skin are as limited for you as they are for the rest of us.
I believe you love this country. I believe you believe in a noble conception of your motivations. So my hope is that the criticisms reach you, that you talk to smart people you do not pay, that you do not show the same kind of hubris and selfishness and ego that led Trump to believe he alone could fix it. In other words, I hope you show some patriotism and get your head out of your ass.
Responding to the harsh blowback from Democrats to Schultz’s entry into the fold, another potential Democratic and/or Independent presidential candidate, Mark Cuban, wrote:
In an ironic twist, a former Obama official is helping orchestrate Schultz’s candidacy. CNBC reports that former Obama aide, Bill Burton, is helping run Schultz’s communications.