Military vet Moulton joins 2020 presidential race

Associated Press

BOSTON

U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton is the latest Democrat to jump in the race for the White House.

The Massachusetts lawmaker and Iraq War veteran made the announcement Monday.

“I’m here to tell you and to tell America that I’m running for president of the United States,” Moulton said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

Moulton said he wanted to run a presidential campaign that would “bring this country back together,” talking “about patriotism, about security, about service.”

“These are issues that for too long Democrats have ceded to Republicans,” he said.

Moulton first came to prominence in 2014 when he unseated long-term incumbent Rep. John Tierney in a Democratic primary and went on to represent the state’s 6th Congressional District, a swath of communities north of Boston including Salem, home of the infamous colonial-era witch trials.

Speculation about a possible Moulton run has been simmering as far back as 2017 when he spoke at a Democratic political rally in Iowa, home of the first-the-the-nation presidential caucuses. At the time, he brushed aside talk of a presidential run.

Talk of possible run ramped up during last year’s election when the former U.S. Marine helped lead an effort to get other Democratic military veterans to run for Congress – a cause he continues to push.