Warren and Castro are kindred spirits who know that running for president is tough if you don't fit the profile

But women who run for president have it just as hard as people of color, if not harder. For years, I've had women friends who were Latino or African American tell me that they faced more challenges because they were women than because they were minorities.

I believe it. Women got the right to vote a half century after those African Americans who were freed slaves were allowed to cast ballots. And Americans have elected, and reelected, an African American president. But -- looking just at the major political parties -- voters have twice taken a pass on electing a female vice president (Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, Sarah Palin in 2008) and once refused to elect a woman president by denying Hillary Clinton the number of electoral college votes needed to claim victory.

Now Warren is getting a taste of ignorance. In her recent kerfuffle with Bernie Sanders over a discussion they had on whether a woman could be elected president, I believe Warren. Given that Sanders has long had a burr under his saddle about so-called identity politics, I find it easy to imagine that he said that a woman would have a tough time defeating Donald Trump in 2020. Of course, that's different from what the media is reporting, that Sanders said a woman could never be elected president. Word games aside, Warren is catching a lot of flak from everyone from conservative radio hosts who hate it when someone plays the "woman card" to Sanders supporters who think their guy got played.

There we go again. Americans are always blaming the victim, and making it seem like it's the pioneer who has the problem.

Castro has been there and done that. So he's in a great position to defend Warren against what is yet another unfair attack.

Warren-Castro? Yeah, that's the ticket.

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Ruben Navarrette's email address is ruben@rubennavarrette.com. His daily podcast, "Navarrette Nation," is available through every podcast app.