All of a sudden, Jon Ossoff, a U.S. senator from Georgia, is on the presidential radar screen.
Keith Duggan, Washington correspondent for the Irish Times, has noticed him: Flickers of Obama: Is Georgia senator Jon Ossoff a Democratic presidential runner? Also Newsweek: Is Jon Ossoff the Man Democrats Have Been Waiting For?
What got their attention was a rally speech that Ossoff gave on February 7 in Atlanta (link below).
Not only is Ossoff qualified, he is not an easy target for Republican demonization. Not only is Newsom from the state that Republicans hate the most — California — he’s also from San Francisco. Pete Buttigieg is gay. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is an unapologetic socialist. (I think that Buttigieg would make a fine secretary of state. And AOC has definitely earned her way into the cabinet of the next Democratic president.)
Whereas if Ossoff has any such political baggage, I’m not aware of it. He has the perfect education — Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service, and the London School of Economics. The Wikipedia article has more on his past and his political positions. Just imagine having someone in the White House who actually knows something about the world!
Once upon a time, it was a rule with the Democratic Party that there had to be a Southerner on the ticket. Democrats foolishly forgot that.
Ossoff is in rally mode in the video, and that’s fine. But it’s high time now that someone does a sitdown policy interview with him.
Update: Jennifer Rubin also writes about Ossoff in her Substack post today: Undaunted in Georgia.