Oprah’s Thinking Presidential Thoughts

Oprah Winfrey is “actively thinking” about running for president, two of her close friends tell CNN.

The pals, who requested anonymity, say Winfrey has been actively considering a 2020 run for months. The rest of the world caught on at Sunday night’s Golden Globes when she gave an extraordinary speech while accepting the Cecil B. DeMille award.

• Her longtime partner, Stedman Graham, told the Los Angeles Times that he wholeheartedly supports the idea. “It’s up to the people,” Graham told the Los Angeles Times. “She would absolutely do it.”
• Meryl Streep voiced support for a President Winfrey. She told the Washington Post: “She launched a rocket tonight. I want her to run for president. I don’t think she had any intention [of declaring]. But now she doesn’t have a choice.”
• Many observers claim that her meticulously constructed speech was an obvious first step in a presidential run. She summarized her life and career, from seeing Sidney Poitier win best actor at the 1964 Academy Awards for his performance in Lilies of the Field, through her efforts in her incredible decades-long career which “to say something about how men and women really behave.”
• During the broadcast, NBC tweeted out praise for Winfrey, calling her “OUR future president.” On Monday, the network walked it back, tweeting: “Yesterday a tweet about the Golden Globes and Oprah Winfrey was sent by a third party agency for NBC Entertainment in real time during the broadcast. It is in reference to a joke made during the monologue and not meant to be a political statement. We have since removed the tweet.”
• Winfrey has shut down rumors about a run before. In an interview with her BFF Gayle King on CBS This Morning recently, Winfrey said “there will be running for office of any kind for me.”
• Winfrey is currently the CEO of the cable channel OWN, a special correspondent for the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes and an investor in companies like Weight Watchers