Andrew Sullivan: “Elizabeth Warren is not afraid. Today, she set out a proposal to integrate Roe v. Wade’s provisions for access to abortion into federal law. She even framed her proposal this way: Congress Can Protect Choice. And she’s right. Congress can legislate on abortion; the matter can be settled through politics, rather than through a strained parsing of the Constitution by the courts. Political arguments can be made, and countered. Voters can go to the polls to support candidates who will vote for such a law, which will make any previous Supreme Court ruling irrelevant.”

“This is the process called politics. And America, for 46 years, has tried to keep abortion out of it. It’s encouraging to see Warren jump into the fray to bring legislative politics back to the subject — and to call the right’s bluff on taking that approach. It’s amazing it has taken this long.”

“Every other major democracy treats abortion this way: through the legislative branch hammering out a compromise.”

“The polls may be middling, the fundraising so-so, but Elizabeth Warren has one key asset in her bid for the Democratic presidential nomination — a campaign plan more clearly defined than that of just about any other candidate,” the Los Angeles Times reports.

“While many of her rivals are recalibrating their strategies and looking for new ways to stand out in a huge field largely eclipsed by former Vice President Joe Biden, Warren is pressing ahead, tortoise and hare style.”

Time: “Warren’s policy proposals have become her brand. On the campaign trail, her off-the-cuff phrase ‘I have a plan for that!’ became so ubiquitous that it morphed into a viral applause line.”

“Voters tend to tell pollsters they prioritize policy over personality. But they said that in 2016 too, when Clinton’s detailed agenda was no match for Trump’s simple slogans and schoolyard nicknames. As her Democratic competitors offer enticing promises largely devoid of specifics, Warren insists on ­talking nuts and bolts.” 

Politico: “The bottom-up evolution of the slogan is a source of encouragement for the Warren campaign, perhaps a sign that the former Harvard professor’s policy-heavy bid is breaking through. Since January, she’s rolled out plans to break up tech companies, forgive over $600 billion in student loan debt, enact a 2 percent wealth tax, provide universal child care and more — lapping the Democratic field on both the volume and scope of policy proposals.”

“She regularly goes into the weeds when taking questions at town halls and sometimes cautions voters that she’s going to ‘nerd out’ for a bit. Some of her supporters see the approach as a way to distinguish her as a heavyweight in a crowded 2020 field. And Warren’s embrace of “I got a plan” has coincided with a rise in her poll numbers over the past two weeks.”

BuzzFeed News: “By the end of March, Warren’s campaign staff numbered about 164 people, according to payroll spending released this week in a quarterly Federal Election Commission disclosure. The 69-year-old candidate, who was the first major contender to jump in the race with a New Year’s Eve announcement, now has a team of more than 170 people and plans to bring on new hires every month in the second quarter of 2019, campaign officials confirmed.”

“As Warren and her advisers see it, it’s part of a larger strategy that diverts from past presidential campaigns that have prioritized spending on television ads. As voters change the way they consume information online, they say, Warren has focused on building a campaign operation in early-voting states like Iowa and New Hampshire, holding events (58 town halls in 14 states) where the emphasis is on answering questions (more than 250 from audiences), engaging with the press (105 one-on-one interviews and 44 media availabilities), and demonstrating substance on policy.”

Politico: “The story of Warren’s awakening—from a true believer in free markets to a business-bashing enforcer of fair markets; from a moderate Republican who occasionally missed an election to one of the most liberal senators in America vying to lead the Democratic Party—breaks the mold of the traditional White House contender and is key to understanding how she sees the world.”

“Warren herself says that in her early academic work she was merely following the dominant theory of the time, which emphasized the efficiency of free markets and unrestrained businesses, rather than holding strong conservative beliefs herself. Still, she acknowledged in our interview that she underwent a profound change in how she viewed public policy early in her academic career, describing the experience as ‘worse than disillusionment’ and ‘like being shocked at a deep-down level.’”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) raised $6 million in the first three months of her presidential campaign, Politico reports.

“The Massachusetts Democrat also burned through more than 85 percent of what she raised in the first quarter.”

CNN: “Warren advisers painted a picture of a campaign that is laying the groundwork for a protracted battle for the Democratic nomination and anticipating the possibility that the Democratic contest turns into a 50-state scramble to pick up delegates.”

New York Times: “She was the first major candidate to announce; she has set the pace on policy, unveiling a series of far-reaching proposals on child care, taxes and the role of large technology companies; and she defied the pleas of her longtime finance director and declared that she would stop pursuing big donations altogether, leading to his resignation.”

“But as the first fund-raising deadline arrives at midnight on Sunday, Ms. Warren — who last year was widely considered a would-be front-runner — finds herself in a political vise. Her rivals on either ideological flank will raise substantially more money in the first quarter than she does, and her focus on policy has not yet translated in the polls.”

Michael Pratt, Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-MA) finance director, is in the process of leaving Warren’s presidential campaign as a result of the senator’s recent decision to swear off soliciting money from wealthy donors during the primaries, CNN reports.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) rejected Republican-fueled rumors that she’s a socialist, saying instead that she’s a capitalist who believes in markets that operate on “a level playing field,” the HuffPost reports.

Said Warren: “It is not capitalism to have one giant that comes in and dominates. What I have supported all the way through are the kinds of things that help level the playing field.”