Elizabeth Warren Takes On Trump's 2020 Campaign

Could 2020 see an electoral match-up between Sen. Elizabeth Warren and President Donald Trump? Despite the recency of the last election, rumors have already begun to swirl about what's to come. Still, as plausible as a Warren/Trump match-up may seem, Warren has a message for Trump about the road ahead.

As the Republican incumbent, there's little doubt that Trump will be up for reelection in 2020. However, the Democratic Party will need to fill the void created by former nominee Hillary Clinton and runner-up Bernie Sanders. It's not that Clinton or Sanders couldn't run again, but Clinton doesn't seem energized to launch a third presidential campaign, and Sanders will be nearing 80 by the time the next election rolls around.

That's where Warren comes in. She's somewhat of a Clinton-Sanders hybrid: An influential woman within the Democratic Party, but her ideology has given her a kind of kinship with Sanders. Unless you're a high-level Democratic strategist, it's far too early to be pondering Warren's chances of winning a presidential election against the current president. In fact, if you ask Warren herself, she's likely to say it's too early for anyone — let alone the current president — to be thinking about 2020.

On Monday, Warren held a town hall in Springfield, Massachusetts, her home state. While there, she referenced the rumors about a potential 2020 showdown with Trump. Perhaps more than at the audience, her message was aimed at the president himself:

He wants to do his tweets, he wants to think about how big his [inauguration] crowd size was, he wants to think about what happens four years from now... What I’m thinking about is what Donald Trump is doing to this country today. That’s what really, really has me up and working hard.

Warren's comments came a few days after Trump said in an interview that it would be a "dream come true" to run against Warren. "I think she would lose so badly," he reportedly told Fox News' Jesse Waters. It's not the first time that Trump has indicated that his sights are already set on 2020.

In February, the president held a campaign-style rally in Florida. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer even reportedly called the rally a "campaign" event. Not to mention, the president referenced his "opponent" on stage — a clear nod to the election season.

Perhaps Warren too is building a platform from which to stand in 2020. Monday's town hall could have been a warm-up for the speeches to come, as she'll need to perfect her anti-Trump stump speech in order to win back the White House for her party. Regardless of her supposed presidential aspirations, Warren's message to Trump is an important reminder that a lot can change in four years — but it takes hard work to make that change a reality.