The people have spoken, and they've crowned a winner in our Bernie Sanders imitation contest.

More than 40 contestants had called our hotline and recorded an imitation of Brooklyn-born Sanders' speaking (and shouting) voice. They touched on crucial themes — underwear, billionaires and damn emails — from the Vermont senator's bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. Many were quite impressive. Others weren't, but we respect the effort. Our panel selected five finalists, and we posted their audio takes online for you to vote.

The winner is Sam Pelletier of Maine, who delivered with his bit on ordering cheesy bread for Sanders volunteers. Congratulations, Sam, and we hope you can make it to Burlington to use your prize: tickets to see Bernie imitator and comedian James Adomian at the Vermont Comedy Club!


In second place: a rant on global warming and underwear by Tony O'Rourke of Williston, who noted in his message that he's "one of those dirty Republicans."


In third place is Joel Levin of New York City, who railed against the Republicans who are double-dipping and triple-dipping their chips. (You'll notice there's a food theme to many of these imitations.)


The fourth-place winner, David Houston, had this suggestion for Ben & Jerry's:


Fifth place went to Joel Najman, whose voice you may recognize from his show on Vermont Public Radio.


And although this one didn't make the final round, it made us laugh.


Thanks to everyone who entered. And now, do we need to have a talk about how much time you've been spending in front of your bathroom mirror perfecting your Bernie impression?