It is time for Elizabeth Warren to reenter the race for the election. Senator Bernie Sanders officially ended his campaign last week, days after former Vice President Joe Biden was accused of sexual assault by Tara Reade, a Capitol Hill staffer who worked for the former senator in the 1990s.
Stop for a minute and think about this. This means both the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, Joe Biden, as well as the presumptive Republican nominee for president, Donald Trump, have been accused of sexual assault. These are incredibly serious allegations. It is possible that some allegations are not true, but that is not very likely given the number of accusers and the fact that false reporting of sexual assault is rare.
How can it be that in the United States, a country of more than 330 million people, and in a field that started with more than 30 candidates, these are the two choices we are left with? It is preposterous and unacceptable. We all know that good and honorable people do exist, and some of them are even politicians. Some of them have even run for president. So how is it that we are left with two accused gropers as our choices this fall?
Do not minimize sexual assault or say that it does not really matter, that it does not impact the ability of a person to govern, and that it is not all that important in the grand scope of things. If you minimize this, you minimize women. The answer is to recognize women by insisting that the one who was always the most qualified of all the candidates running for president, and who also happens to be a woman, needs to reenter the race. Warren suspended her campaign weeks ago, but semantics are important on this. She suspended her campaign. She did not end it. So I am now calling on her to resume it. It is imperative that we have another choice.
I am not a Democrat, and I am not particularly progressive in my political views. I consider myself to be a centrist. I was a lifelong Republican who held classical conservative leanings until I left the party I could no longer recognize after it was hijacked by the Tea Party. I am now unaffiliated with any political party. But I would vote for Warren in a heartbeat.
Warren would be an effective and a moral leader. She would be a unifier, and that is what we desperately need in this country right now. She has experience, she has a plan, and she has a compassionate heart. She also has integrity. She understands and respects the Constitution and the rule of law. Even if I might not agree with some of her more extreme positions, I can at least rest assured that she will respect our system of checks and balances and will not try to overextend her executive reach.
A century after women won the right to vote, it is time for a woman to be our president. There are more women than men in the United States. It is time for us in the majority to have our say. Research clearly indicates that when women are at the governing table, a democracy becomes stronger, more prosperous, and more peaceful. Women more so than men tend to work across party lines, be highly responsive to concerns of constituents, prioritize family, children, health, education, and other key development measures, and secure peaceful agreements to end conflicts.
Warren is a woman eminently qualified to lead in every way. We cannot let her go. In more than 5,000 years of history, save for a few rare incidences, women have had a voice in politics with the right to vote for only the past 100 years. We need Warren today. She should resume her candidacy and challenge Biden, or she can run as an independent. We need a legitimate choice. If we are good enough and wise enough and brave enough, then we will elect her as the next president of the United States.
Sharlee Mullins Glenn is an author and the founder of Mormon Women for Ethical Government, a nonprofit organization that will not endorse parties or candidates. The views written above are those of the author and do not represent the organization. You can follow her on Twitter @SharleeGlenn.