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Elizabeth Warren Rises in Polls

It was just a few months ago that Elizabeth Warren was being written off as too liberal or too divisive to beat Donald Trump. But polls show Democrats are starting to feel differently about her candidacy.

The Warren campaign is focused on "building the organization, and we are seeing that momentum just skyrocketing right now," said supporter Michelle Wu.

As Warren surges in the polls, inching past Bernie Sanders into the No. 2 spot of the Democratic presidential race, Wu is not surprised.

"Elizabeth doing 100 plus town halls all across the country, taking questions from the audience, coming up with real, actual solutions -- that's how you win an election," she said.

Wu, a Boston city councilor who had Warren as a professor at Harvard Law school, says an organizing meeting in Cambridge Wednesday night underscored the energy in the senator's presidential campaign.

"Expecting maybe 100 people -- 500 people RSVP'd," she said. "We had 400 in the room already to go signing up to go knock on doors in New Hampshire and pitch in. So people are excited."

Sanders has noticed, hinting at his own explanation with a retweet of a Politico story about centrists moving toward Warren as an alternative to him. The corporate wing of the Democratic Party is publicly "anybody but Bernie," he added.

"People who were with him four years ago are moving to Elizabeth Warren," said Mara Dolan, a Warren supporter. "And that's a frustrating position for him."

Dolan said Warren is pulling in both moderates and former Sanders supporters.

"It's certainly folks who don't identify with being democratic socialists. Elizabeth Warren has made it very clear that she’s a capitalist," said Dolan. "She's interested in making capitalism work."

Warren supporters expect to see a further increase in Warren's support following next weeks first Democratic debate because they say Warren has proven herself to be a strong debater who has thought through all the big issues in this race.

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