Bernie Sanders: Sticking to script regardless of how it ends
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Version 0 of 1. MOUNT VERNON, Iowa — In a packed college gymnasium on a weekend swing through eastern Iowa, Bernie Sanders made it abundantly clear that he intends to keep running the same campaign through caucus day that he has for the past seven months. While his rivals have pivoted to talk more about terrorism, the Vermont senator kept his focus on the economic issues at the core of his presidential bid, making no excuses to anyone who might suggest he do otherwise. “We are taking on a corporate media establishment that tells us everything we need to know except what’s most important for working families,” Sanders told a raucous crowd of more than 1,100 people at Cornell College. “Don’t allow the front pages of the newspapers and what you see on TV to determine what in fact are the most important issues. You have to determine what those issues are.” [Sanders’s focus on inequality overshadowed as guns, terror grab headlines] With the Iowa caucuses just around the corner, Judgment Day on Sanders’s purposeful and unapologetic approach will soon arrive in the place where it matters most to the fate of his upstart campaign. It will be a test in part of whether Democrats reward Sanders for his unwavering focus on pocketbook issues at a time when many voters have become more interested in electing a commander in chief. Here in Iowa, where a poll released Monday showed Hillary Clinton gaining strength, a Sanders upset on Feb. 1 could set him on a course to be a real contender for the Democratic nomination rather than a gadfly who stays in the race to press the issue of income inequality. Recent polls have shown Sanders with a modest lead over Clinton in New Hampshire. But that’s a win that could be dismissed as a one-off for a politician from a neighboring state. In the wake of terrorist-inspired violence at home and abroad, Clinton has planned a major speech this week on how to “protect the U.S. homeland.” The former secretary of state now routinely highlights her foreign-policy expertise. Over the weekend, Sanders spoke largely about the same issues he has since launching his improbable journey toward the Democratic nomination: the outsized influence of the “billionaire class” and the economic squeeze being felt by everyone else. Talk about terrorism was confined to the closing section of his hour-long stump speeches. [Sanders abruptly pulls Internet ad saying Clinton is being funded by ‘big money interests’] “He’s riding the horse that brought him to the race,” said Dave Nagle, a former congressman and Iowa Democratic Party chairman who attended a Sanders rally Saturday in Waterloo drew that drew nearly 1,500 people. “I think he’s hoping that in the next month or so the focus will turn back to domestic issues.” Like at other events over the weekend, Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, was treated to a rock-star reception and cheered at nearly every turn as he ticked off his plans to provide free college tuition, raise the minimum wage and mandate paid family leave, among many other steps geared toward helping the middle class. Whether that message will attract a large enough following to propel Sanders past Clinton on Feb. 1 remains to be seen. A Des Moines Register/Bloomberg Politics Poll released Monday showed Clinton gaining strength in Iowa but Sanders still in the hunt. Among likely Democratic caucus-goers, Clinton was favored by 48 percent compared with 39 percent for Sanders. Nagle, who is not aligned with a candidate, said the 2016 race reminds him of the 2000 Democratic contest between another establishment candidate, then-Vice President Al Gore, and then-U.S. Sen. Bill Bradley of New Jersey. “Bradley had a lot of enthusiasm among people who were with him,” Nagle said. “There just weren’t enough.” Sanders boosters are hopeful that the result will more closely mirror the 2008 race in which President Obama won the Iowa caucuses by greatly expanding the number of people who attend. (Clinton finished third in Iowa that year.) The Sanders camp is banking on an unusually strong turnout of working-class voters and young people, who lean toward the senator. In the Des Moines Register/Bloomberg poll, Sanders won 58 percent of those under age 45, a group that typically turns out in smaller numbers than older voters. Aides said that the number of stops over the weekend in college towns was no accident. Sanders’s weekend also included a stop at Mount Carmel Baptist Church for the 11 a.m. Sunday service, where he was hosted by Frantz Whitfield, a 33-year-old pastor who until August was a Clinton supporter. As the African American congregation sang “God’s Got a Blessing With My Name On It,” Sanders’s head bobbed along. Following services, Whitfield explained that he had changed allegiances because “when it comes to the issues, Bernie can’t be beat.” Besides his economic message, Whitfield said he had been impressed with Sanders’s commitment to racial justice. Speaking to groups of volunteers over the weekend, before the latest Iowa poll was released, Sanders sounded bullish on his prospects in Iowa and beyond. He repeatedly cited another recent poll out of New Hampshire that showed him leading Clinton there by 10 percentage points. “I think we win in Iowa, we win in New Hampshire, we’ve got a real path to victory and to be on the way to pull off one of the major upsets in the modern history of the United States,” Sanders told reporters in Davenport. Volunteers who came out on a rainy night to greet Sanders at his campaign office there acknowledged that one of the biggest hurdles they still face in pitching Sanders’s candidacy is convincing people he can actually win the presidency. “You have to convince them he’s viable,” said Philip Tunnicliff, 21, a volunteer whose parents are precinct captains for Sanders. “The caucus is where you vote with your heart. This is where we choose.” Sanders’s aides have been frustrated by arguments that Clinton has a better shot at winning the election, citing a series of national polls that show Sanders faring just as well in hypothetical general election match-ups against Donald Trump or other potential GOP nominees. The Sanders campaign’s frustration with the media has also grown in recent days. Late last week, the campaign sent out a news release citing a new study that showed Trump had received a combined 234 minutes of coverage this year on the nightly newscasts of ABC, CBS and NBC compared to just 10 minutes for Sanders. The campaign’s release carried the headline: “Why the Bernie Blackout on Corporate News?” Sanders referenced the study by the Tyndall Report several times over the weekend, including when he was fielding questions in Davenport and called on a reporter from ABC News. “This is ABC,” Sanders announced before taking the question. “This doesn’t get on the air because they only put 20 seconds on the air.” Sanders was also pressed during his session with reporters about why he has not devoted more time to speaking about the Islamic State and terrorism. “It’s a huge issue which must be dealt with, and I believe, as I’ve mentioned time and time again, we’ve got to crush ISIS,” Sanders said. “But it is not the only issue.” |