Monday, March 14, 2016
"Bernie's our guy," the 74-year-old retiree said Monday morning after watching the Democratic presidential candidate deliver a speech in hardscrabble Youngstown, Ohio.
Wearing a black International Brotherhood of Teamsters jacket over a white "Keep Our Pension Promises" T-shirt, Zapotosky recalled the many times Sanders went to bat for his union. He looked guilty about what he said next.
"I'm sorry to say, tomorrow I'm not going to vote for him, though. I'm going to vote for Trump to knock our governor out of the box," he said, referring to New York real estate mogul Donald Trump and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, both Republicans. "Then, in November, I'll vote Democrat, because I am a Democrat."
That's bad news for Sanders, who is counting on blue-collar voters such as Zapotosky to push him over the finish line Tuesday in Ohio's presidential primary. A new Quinnipiac University poll released Monday morning showed him gaining on former secretary of state Hillary Clinton but still trailing her in the state by a margin of 51 to 46 percentage points.
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It was tough to discern differences that would help voters decide between them.
The Lake Champlain Regional Chamber of Commerce hosted a breakfast question-and-answer session featuring Sue Minter, former secretary of the Agency of Transportation, and Matt Dunne, a former state senator and Google manager. House Speaker Shap Smith (D-Morristown), who announced he was running, then suspended his campaign because of his wife’s cancer diagnosis, was in the audience.
The two Republican candidates for governor, Lt. Gov. Phil Scott and Bruce Lisman, a retired Wall Street executive, participated in a similar event in February.
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"Welcome to the most important state in the union this Tuesday," he told 3,300 Democratic activists and officials gathered at the Greater Columbus Convention Center for an Ohio Democratic Party dinner. "And the most important state in the union on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November."
Brown may have been exaggerating, but he had a point. Though Florida and Illinois will dole out more Democratic delegates in Tuesday's five primaries, Ohio's status as a Midwestern bellwether — and a must-win general election state — could make it the biggest prize of the week.
Fearing a repeat of Sanders' come-from-behind victory in Michigan last week — fueled, in part, by a protectionist message that has found resonance in the Rust Belt — Clinton and her allies have been laboring to convince Ohioans that she is no free-trade zealot.
"I trust Hillary Clinton on trade and manufacturing," Brown said as he introduced her in Columbus. "I trust her on this because I know what she will do: fight for American jobs with a different trade policy, different tax policy and a different manufacturing policy."
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Hillary Clinton , Sherrod Brown , Ohio Democratic Party , presidential campaign , Recommended Reading , Image , Video , Web Only
Sunday, March 13, 2016
The threat came a day after Trump blamed Sanders for mass protests that led the Republican candidate to cancel a Friday rally in Chicago. Speaking in Cleveland on Saturday, Trump called on Sanders to “get your people in line.”
Though published reports indicate that some of those protesting Trump in Chicago were Sanders supporters, the Vermont senator said in a written statement Saturday that his campaign “did not organize the protests.” In the same statement, Sanders called Trump a “pathological liar.”
Writing on Twitter Sunday morning, Trump further escalated the rhetoric.
“Bernie Sanders is lying when he says his disruptors aren’t told to go to my events,” Trump wrote. “Be careful Bernie, or my supporters will go to yours!”
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Thursday, March 10, 2016
Though legislators were already barred from raising such money for their personal campaign accounts until the end of the biennium, they had long skirted the rule by doing so through so-called leadership political action committees. Those PACs would invite lobbyists to mid-session fundraisers — featuring legislative leaders — and then direct the proceeds to legislators' reelection campaigns.
Last year's law banned the practice.
But as former U.S. Supreme Court justices John Paul Stevens and Sandra Day O'Connor once wrote, "Money, like water, will always find an outlet."
Last month, according to Vermont Democratic Party executive director Conor Casey, the House Democratic leadership PAC was dissolved, and its sole staff member, Katherine Levasseur, was absorbed by the state party. Levasseur is still working to elect House Democrats, but because she now reports to the party, which was not affected by last year's law, her salary can once again be paid with lobbyist contributions.
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The bill would also require retailers to display e-cigarettes in places accessible only to sales personnel — such as behind counters or in locked displays.
Their action means that the bill will come up for a vote in the House next week. It still has to be considered in the Senate.
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As Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton courted Hispanic voters at the Univision-sponsored debate, its moderators played a 30-year-old video from the archives of a Burlington public access station. In an interview with CCTV Center for Media & Democracy executive director Lauren-Glenn Davitian, Sanders praised Cuba’s then-president Fidel Castro for providing health care and education to his people.
Clinton seized the opportunity to tie Sanders to the communist dictator.
“I think in that same interview, he praised what he called the ‘revolution of values’ in Cuba, and talked about how people were working for the common good, not for themselves,” Clinton said. “I just couldn’t disagree more.”
Sanders responded that Cuba is “of course, an authoritarian, undemocratic country.”
“I hope very much, as soon as possible, it becomes a democratic country,” Sanders said. “On the other hand, it would be wrong not to state that, in Cuba, they’ve made some good advances in health care ... They have made some progress in education.”
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Wednesday, March 9, 2016
"I think that's my last recourse," he told Seven Days .
But four of the five members of that panel, the Senate Rules Committee, said Wednesday that they oppose McAllister's request.
"We made a decision on this," said Senate President Pro Tempore John Campbell (D-Windsor), who chairs the committee. "The Senate vote was very clear about suspension, so I don't think anything changes."
McAllister, who is facing criminal proceedings for multiple sexual assault charges, thinks something has changed. At the time of his suspension, he was scheduled to go on trial in February. That trial has since been delayed, and jury selection is now scheduled for May.
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Tuesday, March 8, 2016
By the end of the evening, Sanders was leading Clinton 50 to 48 percent, with nearly every precinct reporting.
“This has been a fantastic night in Michigan,” Sanders said in brief remarks from Miami, shortly before the race was called in his favor. “What tonight means is that ... the political revolution that we’re talking about is strong in every part of the country.”
Once written off as a regional curio, Sanders demonstrated Tuesday that he can compete in the industrial Midwest. That should open up opportunities for him next week when delegate-rich Ohio and Illinois hold their primaries.
But Sanders continues to underperform in the South. Even as he won Michigan by a hair, Clinton dominated him in Mississippi on Tuesday, winning the state 83 to 17 percent. By the end of the night, the former secretary of state had won 87 more delegates to the Democratic National Convention, while Sanders took an additional 69.
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The state has collected and is testing samples from 135 more wells, with results expected next week.
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