Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Monday welcomed the support of progressives who previously tried to draft Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) into the race.
“Elizabeth Warren is a good friend. Like millions of her supporters around the country, I have great respect and admiration for her,” said Sanders.
{mosads}His comments come after Ready For Warren announced last week they were ending their effort to convince Warren to run for the White House and have opted to launch another progressive movement, called Ready To Fight, supporting Sanders.
He said it was “so gratifying that so many people who wanted Elizabeth to run for president are now getting behind our campaign to restore America’s middle class and take on Wall Street and the big banks.”
Sanders has cut into Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton’s still-formidable lead in the polls. However, he remains a long-shot candidate.
Sanders’ New Hampshire political director, Kurt Ehrenberg, was state director of Run Warren Run, a group funded by MoveOn.org and Democracy For America that wanted to draft Warren. That group also disbanded recently.