Warren ally announces run for contested House seat

A consumer advocate who has worked alongside progressive stalwart Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) announced Monday that she will run to unseat Rep. Mimi Walters (R-Calif.) in 2018.

Katie Porter, a professor at the University of California, Irvine, is running in a district Hillary Clinton won in 2016. And she’s backed by both Warren and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), two progressive senators she has worked with in the past.

“As a consumer advocate, I’ve spent my career fighting Wall Street banks who cheat consumers and families,” Porter said in a statement announcing her campaign.

{mosads}”Now, I’m running for Congress to take that fight to Washington. I’ll take on Donald Trump and the powerful Washington special interests who control Congress.”

In the lead-up to the 2008 financial crisis, Porter took on Wall Street banks over mortgage fraud. In 2012, she was tapped to be California’s banking watchdog.

“Katie is a fighter,” Warren said. “There’s no one I trust more to take on Donald Trump and the entrenched special interests in Washington on behalf of working families.”

Walters, who has served in Congress since 2014, has become a top Democratic target in 2018. While the seat has been represented by a Republican since 1983, Clinton carried her Orange County-based district by more than 5 points last year.

The California Republican has been criticized for voting in committee to advance the House GOP’s ObamaCare repeal-and-replace bill. The bill, which scored low approval ratings from voters, was eventually pulled in the face of Republican opposition.

Democrats hope to flip House seats in their quest to retake the chamber, pointing to the historical election trend that sees the president’s party lose House seats in a midterm.