Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) told MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski that she plans to decide by the end of 2018 whether she will run for president in 2020.
“It’s a very serious decision,” Harris emphasized during the Know Your Value conference in San Francisco. “Over the holiday, I will make that decision with my family.”
“Let’s be honest. It’s going to be ugly,” she added of the challenges her campaign would entail. “When you break things, it is painful. And you get cut. And you bleed.”
Many Democrats in the Senate are weighing a presidential run over the holidays. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) joked that he was concerned the Democrats would have an “attendance problem” because of the half-dozen presidential hopefuls.
In the latest polling of Democratic voters on potential 2020 presidential nominees, former vice president Joe Biden remains the top choice with the support of 28 percent of Democratic and Independent voters.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) follows behind him with 21 percent.
Remarkably Rep. Beto O’Rourke (R-TX), who lost his Senate race against Sen. Ted Cruz, was the next choice with 7 percent of voters.
Sen. Harris ranked with Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Cory Booker (D-NJ) and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg in the low single-digits.
She has the support of Cher to run alongside Biden, the singer said in an interview Sunday.
Harris espouses many leftist policies. She is among the senators who support Medicare for all and she has called for raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour.