WASHINGTON – Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper said Thursday that he’s “not quite to that point” of announcing a presidential run, but used a gathering of US mayors in Washington to introduce himself to a more national audience.
“In my lifetime things have never been worse in this country,” the Democrat proclaimed.
“In my office we don’t say the word Donald Trump,” he added. “You will end up wasting too much time. It’s never a five-minute discussion, it’s always a 45-minute discussion.”
Hickenlooper then turned to his own roots. He talked about being the son of a twice-widowed mother and how he moved from Philadelphia to Colorado “attracted by the notion of freedom and independence.”
“What I found was a world that had been successfully settled due to collaboration,” he said. “You talk about all the shootouts on main street, there were only about a half-dozen in recorded history, but there were tens of thousands of barn raisings.”
He recalled being laid off as a geologist, only to reinvent himself as a craft brewer and restaurateur, opening his Wynkoop brewpub in a desolate neighborhood, which is now Denver’s trendy LoDo.
He eventually became the city’s mayor.
“I had never run for student council in my life,” Hickenlooper said of the uphill battle he faced for a possible White House run.
“I didn’t hang out with the people who did. I’m not trying to insult anyone in this room,” he said to laughs.