Marianne Williamson knocks Vogue for not including her in photo shoot of women running for president

Marianne Williamson knocked Vogue magazine on Tuesday for not including her in a photo shoot of the women running in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, saying the Framers of the Constitution did not make Vogue “the gatekeeper.”

Vogue ran a feature on Monday entitled “Madam President? Five Candidates on What It Will Take to Shatter the Most Stubborn Glass Ceiling.”

{mosads}The profile and photo shoot included five presidential candidates and Democratic lawmakers — Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii), Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.), Sen. Kamala Harris (Calif.), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (Minn.) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.)

Williamson, the only other woman running for the Democratic nomination, was excluded from the high-profile magazine shoot with photographer Annie Leibovitz.

She told CNN’s Kate Bolduan that she learned of the snub when the article came out.  

New in Vogue: A story by @amychozick about the women lawmakers running in 2020 for president.

Photograph by @annieleibovitz https://t.co/G03DcguZnm pic.twitter.com/uEZzrWF5oE

— Yashar Ali (@yashar) July 1, 2019

“The Framers of the Constitution were very clear about who’s qualified to run for president. They did not make any media, certainly not Vogue magazine, the gatekeeper here,” Williamson said. “The Framers of the Constitution said in order to run for president, in order to be qualified to be president, you have to have been born here, you have to have lived here 14 years, and you have to be 35 years or older.”

“If they wanted to say you had to be an elected official, they would have. And they didn’t for a reason,” she added.

Williamson said the Founding Fathers left it up to each generation to determine what “skill set is necessary in order to navigate the times in which we live.”

She hit the “insidious” bias of those in the media who suggest that only those who have been elected to office in the past are qualified for the Oval Office. 

Vogue, in a statement to CNN, said it wanted the focus to be on the politicians. 

“We’re in no way discrediting Marianne Williamson and all she’s accomplished. For the photo, Vogue wanted to highlight the five female lawmakers who bring a collective 40 years of political experience to this race,” the magazine said. 

“I just saw it online like everybody else… nobody talked to me.”@marwilliamson, on being the only female presidential candidate excluded from a Vogue story.

“When we asked… we were told the decision was to make it only about the elected officials.” https://t.co/GNU0Nwmm0m pic.twitter.com/DvLyc8eHVG

— CNN (@CNN) July 2, 2019

The candidate, who was onstage with Gillibrand and Harris during the second night of the Democratic debates in Miami last week, is briefly mentioned in the Vogue article and is referred to as “spiritual adviser to Oprah Winfrey.”

Williamson’s communications director Patricia Ewing last week pushed back on the title of “spiritual guru (or any type of guru).”

“Also not her occupation: Oprah’s BFF or Oprah’s guru. (Or, any title that rightfully belongs to Gayle King.)” the statement said.

The Vogue article does mention that Williamson is tied with Gillibrand in recent polls with less than 1 percent support.