Rep. Joe Cunningham, South Carolina Democrat, on Monday compared the 2020 election to the initial summit of Mount Everest and said Democrats don’t want to be in a position where they scale the mountain only to die on the way back.
He said Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man credited with reaching the summit, found a body near the top and that people then questioned whether Hillary was really the first to make it.
Mr. Cunningham said Hillary’s response was: “Well, there’s something to be said about making it back down.”
“Winning the primary isn’t good enough,” Mr. Cunningham said. “To make it to the top of the mountain, it’s not good enough. There’s something to be said about making it back down. There’s something to be said about winning in November.”
Mr. Cunningham, a first-term congressman who was narrowly elected in 2018, made the comments at a fundraiser for Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, according to a pool report of the event.
“There’s some people who win the primary but lose disastrously in November,” Mr. Cunningham said, noting that Ms. Klobuchar is one of those people who can win in November.
“Because winning elections in Minnesota is sure as hell a lot more difficult than winning an election in Vermont as a Democrat,” he said, taking a shot at Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont.
The congressman has not endorsed a presidential candidate and also appeared at an event for former Vice President Joseph R. Biden on Monday.
But he has warned that it would be tough to defend socialism in a state like South Carolina, which holds its Democratic presidential primary on Saturday.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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