Monday, August 24, 2015
But even Sanders couldn't resist the opportunity Monday to handicap the presidential horse race during a brief media scrum in Conway, N.H. When a reporter noted that many pundits believe Vice President Joe Biden's flirtation with a presidential run was "a direct result of the frontrunner Hillary Clinton's vulnerability," Sanders said he sensed that vulnerability.
"Well, I think the evidence is pretty clear," the senator said. "We are gaining. I think what the polls seem to indicate is that Hillary Clinton's support seems to be receding a bit. But we've got a long way to go. Joe would be a formidable opponent."
Asked several times about Biden and his not-so-subtle machinations, Sanders struck a positive note, saying, "You're not going to find a guy who's more decent than Joe Biden is." But he also made clear that he was ready to take on his former Senate colleague.
"What I promise Joe, if he decides to get into this race, is that I will, as I have done up 'til now, run an issue-oriented campaign," Sanders said. "Joe's views, I suspect — I know — on a number of issues are very different than mine. And what the American people are entitled to is a serious debate on serious issues."
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That's right. I'm talkin' about Deez Nuts.
The parody presidential candidate — actually a 15-year-old farm boy from Iowa named Brady Olson — made a splash last week when he picked up the support of between 7 and 9 percent of those surveyed in North Carolina, Iowa and Minnesota by Public Policy Polling.
Though he's running as an independent, Mr. Nuts made a surprise entry into the Democratic and Republican primaries on Friday.
"Just gonna throw this out there now," Nuts wrote on his Facebook page. "This is not for the general election. My endorsement for the Democratic nomination goes to Vermont senator Bernie Sanders."
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Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Four years later, Sanders endorsed Jackson's 1988 campaign, introduced him at a University of Vermont speech and held a fundraiser for him at the Windjammer Restaurant.
Now, some three decades later, the tables are turned. During a brief fundraising trip to Chicago on Monday, Sanders — now a U.S. senator and candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination — sought Jackson's counsel.
While the precise nature of the meeting wasn't clear, a Sanders spokesman indicated in a brief statement that the two discussed matters related to racial justice. Twice this summer, the candidate has been confronted by Black Lives Matter protesters during public events, forcing a strained discussion about his commitment to fighting discrimination.
"Longtime friends, the senator and the civil rights leader held a very productive, hour-long meeting on important issues confronting the country and the African American community," spokesman Michael Briggs wrote in the statement.
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Monday, August 17, 2015
Billionaire businessman Donald Trump, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, had touched down on the fairgrounds earlier that day in his $7 million Sikorsky helicopter, offering free rides to children. As Sanders promised to lead a global response to climate change during his Soapbox speech, the chopper flew overheard, according to the multiple media outlets.
"There's Donald Trump," Sanders said, gesturing aloft. "What can we do?"
The crowd responded, "Bernie! Bernie! Bernie!"
"You know, I apologize. We left the helicopter at home," Sanders continued. "It's in the garage. Forgot to bring it."
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Donald Trump , helicopter , Iowa State Fair , Chuck Todd , Meet the Press , presidential campaign , Recommended Reading , Image , Video , Web Only
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
A survey conducted by Franklin Pierce University and the Boston Herald shows Sanders leading Clinton 44 percent to 37 percent among Democrats likely to vote in the New Hampshire primary. Vice President Joe Biden, who has not entered the race, drew 9 percent in the poll, which was conducted over the weekend and released Wednesday. Its margin of error was plus or minus 4.7 percent.
"It just shows you that the more people know Bernie Sanders, the more they like him," says Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs.
Indeed, the percentage of Granite Staters with a favorable opinion of Sanders has grown by 20 points since Franklin Pierce last polled the state in March. Now, 76 percent view him favorably, compared with 80 percent who view Clinton favorably.
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Tuesday, August 11, 2015
But when the insurgent presidential candidate traveled to Los Angeles Monday night, he got a little help from a star of the small screen: comedian Sarah Silverman. The New Hampshire native introduced her fellow New Englander to a crowd of 17,500 people packed inside the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena for another of Sanders' signature mega-rallies.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I give you — if we're all very smart and a little bit lucky — the next president of the United States: Sen. Bernie Sanders," Silverman said to the cheering throng.
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Monday, August 10, 2015
The action came during a three-day trip down the West Coast, which concludes Monday with stops in Oakland and Los Angeles.
In Seattle on Saturday, Sanders drew 12,000 supporters to the Hec Edmundson Pavilion, according to the Seattle Times, and another 3,000 to an overflow area. The next day, he topped even that record by drawing 19,000 to Portland's Moda Center, home to the NBA's Portland Trail Blazers. According to CNN, which cited an arena spokesman, another 9,000 Portlandians were turned away at the door.
But similar to three weeks ago, when Black Lives Matter protesters interrupted an event in Phoenix, those rallies were overshadowed by a protest earlier Saturday in Seattle. At a rally meant to celebrate Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, Sanders was "shoved aside" by protesters and "pushed away when he tried to take the microphone back," according to the Associated Press.
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Thursday, August 6, 2015
He wrote DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz a letter calling for a "a series of debates beginning this summer." He urged supporters to sign a petition requesting the same. And he told Chuck Todd, moderator of NBC's "Meet the Press," that he'd like to debate Republican presidential candidates, too.
Those pleas, apparently, fell on deaf ears.
On Thursday, the DNC unveiled its debate schedule — and it still plans to allow just six. In a written statement, Sanders said he was "disappointed, but not surprised" by the news.
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Liberty University, the Christian college in Virginia founded by Jerry Falwell, requires its students to attend convocations. This fall's speakers include Christian singers and authors, the university’s own senior vice president for spiritual development, and Darryl Strawberry, the former baseball player who founded a Christian ministry.
Oh, and Bernie Sanders, the independent Jewish senator from Vermont who is seeking the Democratic nomination for president and was quoted in June in the Christian Science Monitor as saying "I'm not particularly religious."
Sanders is scheduled to speak September 14. He’ll be addressing what the university describes as “North America’s largest weekly gathering of Christian students,” about 12,000 people.
“We have speakers from all walks of life,” Liberty University's president, Jerry Falwell Jr., the late founder’s son, said Thursday by phone from Virginia.
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Monday, July 27, 2015
A week after Black Lives Matter protesters interrupted his appearance at a Netroots Nation conference in Phoenix, Sanders addressed racial injustice directly Saturday night at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference's national convention in Baton Rouge.
“To my mind it makes eminently more sense to invest in jobs and education, rather than jails and incarceration,” Sanders told the civil rights group, according to the Washington Post. “That is an issue that we have in common, do we not?”
More from the Post:
Sanders came to Baton Rouge armed with a bevy of statistics about black Americans and a handful of policy pronouncements. He called for the “demilitarization” of police forces, widespread use of body cameras, an end to privately run prisons and an effort to address the “over-incarceration” of nonviolent offenders.
His speech was interrupted frequently by applause — albeit more tepid than he typically elicits at campaign rallies.
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