Here is a new name to consider. Obama favors the former Mass Governor Devel Patrick
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/01/obamas-inner-circle-is-urging-deval-patrick-to-run-215443
Barack Obama is nudging him to run. His inner circle is actively encouraging it. Obama world’s clear and away 2020 favorite is sitting right here, on the 38th floor of the John Hancock Building, in a nicely decorated office at Bain Capital.
And Deval Patrick has many thoughts on what he says is Donald Trump’s governing by fear and a dishonest pitch for economic nostalgia, while encouraging a rise in casual racism and ditching any real commitment to civil rights.
Obama strategist David Axelrod has had several conversations with Patrick about running, and eagerly rattles off the early primary map logic: small-town campaign experience from his 2006 gubernatorial run that will jibe perfectly with Iowa, neighbor-state advantage in New Hampshire and the immediate bloc of votes he’d have as an African-American heading into South Carolina.
Valerie Jarrett, Obama’s close adviser and friend, says that a President Patrick is what “my heart desires.”
David Simas, Obama’s political director in the White House and now the CEO of his foundation, used to be Patrick’s deputy chief of staff and remains perhaps his biggest fan on the planet.
Obama himself—who is personally close to Patrick, and counts him among the very small group of people whom he thinks has actual political talent—has privately encouraged him to think about it, among others.
but since finishing up as governor two years ago amid mixed reviews, Patrick has largely disappeared from politics. There was a brief rumble about how he might run for president himself, or might get considered to be Hillary Clinton’s running mate, but neither thought ever actually went anywhere.
Instead, he’s been at Bain Capital, running a new social good private equity fund called Double Impact, which has raised $390 million for investments in small- and medium-size companies that he said need to show a focus on “sustainability, health and wellness, and then a place-based strategy we’re calling ‘community building,’ which is about companies that are intentional about creating good jobs and economic activity in places of chronic underemployment.” The first two investments are in a chain of small, low-cost gyms in Michigan and Indiana that he hopes will bring affordable fitness to underserved areas, and in a company in Texas that diverts organic waste.
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Not that any of this matters to Bernie Sanders-ized Democrats who are suspicious of finance types to begin with, and were taught by Obama’s 2012 brutal campaign attacks on Mitt Romney to think of Bain as a curse word—though notably, not by Patrick himself, who despite his friendship with Obama and co-chairmanship of the campaign, repeatedly refused to join in on the bashing.
“When I joined the firm, I think it took two or three days to work out the terms, and 2½ weeks to figure out how to announce it,” Patrick said, acknowledging the awkwardness he was getting himself into.
