They's no way of telling how many characters will be displayed in the lede. I think it's a problem with the In The News section. I struggle when I put something In The News to create a representative teaser of the article. Some times it will display nothing, some, or all and it doesn't matter how many characters I use.

It seems to me that the piece is pointing out the intense effort that some Republican heavy hitters are already putting into trashing Warren, specifically Mercer and the Massachusetts First super-Pac he's supporting:

Mercer’s contribution to Massachusetts First is the biggest he’s made to any candidate or political entity in 2017, according to Politico, citing Federal Election Commission records.

 It's interesting that it also describes the trail from the PAC's anti-Warren radio ads to a Boston based right-wing talk radio host "gotcha" video blasted out over social media to Trump and conservative news outlets ... eventually getting attention:

By the end of the week, the Kuhner clip began to gain traction, and was posted at bigger and bigger conservative sites, including The Gateway Pundi, The Daily Caller, The Washington Times , Fox News, and The American Mirror, which was finally linked on Twitter by Drudge.

The Cut tries to cite the Times article as evidence that the mainstream media - the "left" - has taken it from there, but I think they miss the mark on that.  The NYT piece is about the different dynamics/styles of Warren and Sanders; also worth a read but not as a segue.  

My takeaway is that the game of negative drip-drip so perfectly used against Clinton and others (I actually think they're using the Clinton connection because they're both women politicians, basically) has already begun against Warren and it will grow.  Is the game already being helped along by more and more media attention?  Of course.  That's the point ... but that it's already begun against her specifically, with Mercer's backing and starting in her very blue home state makes me wonder if there isn't a more coordinated effort afoot.