Cory Booker explains why he still loves Trump

As he gears up for a possible 2020 run, Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) hasn't changed his mind: He still loves President Trump.

Booker in an interview with The Atlantic explained why he has continuously expressed love toward the president who he opposes on countless policy issues and who has attacked him publicly on Twitter. "My faith tradition is love your enemies," he said. "It's not complicated for me, if I aspire to be who I say I am. I am a Christian American." This is not the same thing as being "complicit in oppression" or "tolerant of hatred," Booker said.

The New Jersey senator also explained that he loves Trump voters. "Millions and millions of good Americans, good decent Americans, voted for Donald Trump," he said.

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"If we become a party that is about what we're against, I don't think that's a winning strategy," Booker said more broadly about the Democratic Party. "I think if we give all of our energy— psychic, mental — toward Donald Trump, it makes him powerful." Besides, "there's common pain in this country," Booker observed, and if Democrats "make Donald Trump your central focus, then it's going to be much harder to get to a sense of common purpose."

Booker also decried the polarization of the country, pointing to his experience getting "pilloried on Twitter" for hugging the late Sen. John McCain after he was diagnosed with cancer. "We are heading toward a point in my lifetime where I haven't seen a level of tribalism like this," Booker said. Read the full interview at The Atlantic.