The consultant from Hawaii, who usually defied her personal social gathering, introduced the top of her marketing campaign and mentioned she would again Joe Biden.
Representative Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who ran a international policy-focused marketing campaign for the presidential nomination of a celebration she sharply criticized, introduced on Thursday that she was dropping out of the race.
Ms. Gabbard, who had been one in every of solely three candidates and the one lady remaining within the Democratic major, mentioned she would throw her assist to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who has accrued a virtually insurmountable lead within the delegate depend.
Throughout the race, her marketing campaign struggled to realize traction, by no means breaking double digits in state or nationwide polls. She received solely two delegates within the major contests, each in American Samoa, the place she was born.
In a video posted to social media on Thursday, Ms. Gabbard mentioned she felt she may higher serve the nation within the midst of the coronavirus pandemic in her capability as a significant within the Hawaii Army National Guard.
“Our nation is facing an unprecedented global crisis that highlights the inextricable bonds of humanity, and how foreign policy and domestic policy are inseparable,” she mentioned. “The best way I can be of service at this time is to continue to work for the health and well-being of the people of Hawaii and our country in Congress, and to stand ready to serve in uniform should the Hawaii National Guard be activated.”
Ms. Gabbard, who resigned her vice chairmanship on the Democratic National Committee in 2016 to endorse the presidential marketing campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Mr. Biden’s closest competitor this yr, mentioned she had “great appreciation” for Mr. Sanders’s work.
She additionally cited her relationship with Mr. Biden’s son Beau, who served within the Delaware Army National Guard and died in 2015.
“Although I may not agree with the vice president on every issue, I know that he has a good heart and is motivated by his love for our country and the American people,” she mentioned. “I’m assured that he’ll lead our nation guided by the spirit of aloha — respect and compassion — and thus assist heal the divisiveness that has been tearing our nation aside.”
Ms. Gabbard, 38, introduced late final yr that she wouldn’t search re-election to Congress within the fall.
She campaigned for president on a noninterventionist international coverage, denouncing “regime-change wars” and the thought of the United States because the world’s police. She mentioned her personal deployments — she served two excursions of obligation within the Middle East as a member of the National Guard — had taught her the prices of struggle firsthand.
“We should be coming to other leaders in other countries with respect, building a relationship based on cooperation rather than with, you know, a police baton,” she mentioned final yr.
Her unorthodox platform, a mixture of noninterventionist international coverage, liberal social coverage and libertarian leanings on points like drug decriminalization, attracted assist from an uncommon array of public backers.
Alt-right web stars, white nationalists, libertarian activists and among the greatest boosters of Mr. Trump heaped reward on Ms. Gabbard.
Many Democrats had been way more skeptical of her effort, at a loss to elucidate her frequent appearances on Fox News, favorable protection in Russian state media and an ideology that each argued for getting out of international wars and refused to strongly condemn some autocratic leaders.
A public struggle with Hillary Clinton introduced consideration and fund-raising {dollars}, holding Ms. Gabbard on the first debate stage and attracting some assist from unbiased and Republican voters, notably in libertarian-leaning New Hampshire.
Ms. Gabbard was as soon as seen as a rising star within the Democratic Party, whilst she typically defied it.
Her progressive economics and noninterventionist international coverage appeared like apparent points of interest for Democrats, her army résumé gave her additional credibility, and he or she broke limitations as the primary Hindu and the primary American Samoan elected to Congress.
So it was not shocking when she entered the presidential race final January, although no sitting consultant has been elected president in 140 years.
In a race that at its peak included six feminine candidates, Ms. Gabbard ended up turning into the final lady standing.
But whereas she had a deeply devoted base, it was not massive sufficient to maintain her. And at occasions, she gave the impression to be campaigning towards the identical social gathering whose nomination she was searching for.
“Our Democratic Party, unfortunately, is not the party that is of, by and for the people,” she mentioned at a debate in November. “It is a party that has been and continues to be influenced by the foreign policy establishment in Washington, represented by Hillary Clinton and others’ foreign policy, by the military industrial complex and other greedy corporate interests.”
President Trump’s re-election marketing campaign seized on that comment, clipping the primary sentence and blasting it out on Twitter earlier than the controversy had even ended.
Perhaps no emblem of the institution was a greater foil for Ms. Gabbard than Mrs. Clinton, who recommended in October that Russia was backing Ms. Gabbard’s marketing campaign and that Republicans had been “grooming” her as a third-party candidate.
Ms. Gabbard pushed again fiercely, calling Mrs. Clinton “the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long” after which suing her for defamation.
The conflict helped increase Ms. Gabbard’s profile and received over some voters — together with independents and conservatives — who dislike the Clintons, whereas concurrently alienating some members of the social gathering’s standard base.
Ms. Gabbard additionally broke from the Democratic pack on impeachment. She was the final candidate to again an inquiry final yr, and when the articles of impeachment got here to the House ground in December, she was the one Democrat who refused to solid a yes-or-no vote.
“I came to the conclusion that I could not in good conscience vote either yes or no,” she mentioned on the time, calling the method too partisan. “I am standing in the center and have decided to vote present.”
