An Affluence of Activism: Bernie Sanders' Work For the Democratic Party

INTRODUCTION

On 21 Jan., the Hollywood Reporter reported that Hillary Clinton had created a flattering 4-part docu-series about her favorite subject: herself. In the accompanying interview, it was revealed that, in the doc, Clinton had hurled venom at her 2016 Democratic primary rival Bernie Sanders:

"He was in Congress for years. He had one senator support him. Nobody likes him, nobody wants to work with him, he got nothing done. He was a career politician. It's all just baloney and I feel so bad that people got sucked into it."

Sanders supporters were quick to respond, pointing out polling showing that Sanders was actually the most popular U.S. Senator, setting the hashtag #IlikeBernie to trending on Twitter, pointing out the hilarious lack of self-awareness in Hillary Clinton criticizing anyone as a "career politician" who "got nothing done." For all the years of self-righteous preaching by Clinton and her followers about "party unity," Clinton refused to say she would endorse and campaign for Sanders if he became the nominee and went on to conjure up an absurdist fantasy wherein Sanders is a horrible sexist surrounded by horrible people who, in Clinton's fevered imagination, relish attacking women.

Part of Clinton's attack wasn't really new. In her godawful 2017 book "What Happened," Clinton had advanced, as this author wrote at the time,

"the notion that Sanders' entire campaign was illegitimate, a fraud, nothing more than a scam launched and carried out with ignoble motives that succeeded only in causing a lot of damage for no good reason. In her telling, Sanders wasn't honorably representing the views of a legitimate constituency. Instead, she insists she and Sanders had few real policy differences and he was just following her around like some malevolent imp peddling those bigger-and-louder 'magic abs' copies of her own proposals and helping Republicans win. '[H]e isn’t a Democrat,' she writes, offering up a tired, terminally out-of-touch line she's had her followers spewing for two years. 'He didn't get into the race to make sure a Democrat won the White House, he got in to disrupt the Democratic Party.'"

The new doc was set to debut at the Sundance Film Festival only days before the Iowa Caucus.

This came a few weeks after Clinton, appearing on the Howard Stern show, had attacked Sanders and within a few days of the Hollywood Reporter interview, she was at it again. Appearing on the podcast "Your Primary Playlist," Clinton was asked what Sanders could do to unite Democrats against Donald Trump: "Well, he can do it, for one. That's not our experience from 2016." She whined that Sanders' "campaign and his principal supporters were just very difficult and really constantly not just attacking me but my supporters... It was very distressing and such a contrast between what we did to unite in '08. All the way up until the end, a lot of people highly identified with (Sanders’) campaign, were urging people to vote third party, urging people not to vote--it had an impact."

In reality, of course, the overwhelming majority of Sanders' supporters went on to vote for Clinton in the general--a subject about which this writer recently wrote a substantial article. Without their support, Clinton would have finished with a 6.6 million to 7.6 million or more popular-vote deficit with Trump and would have lost three additional states and probably a 4th. Sanders' efforts to rally support behind Clinton were more successful than her own tepid 2008 efforts to rally her supporters behind Obama. By more than one estimate, up to 1/4 of her primary supporters that year went on to vote for John McCain in the general election. Even one polling estimate that is kinder to Clinton only has her matching Sanders' performance in rallying his supporters.

The myth Clinton is feeding here is one propagated by the Clinton cult since 2016, that after Clinton secured the Democratic nomination, Sanders did little or nothing to get his supporters to unify behind her campaign. The gall in this is as unmitigated as bile gets. After the way Clinton and the DNC--which, it ultimately turned out, were really the same thing--did everything they could to tilt the primary/caucus process in Clinton's favor, anyone with any conscience at all would be abjectly grateful that Sanders ever offered so much as a single kind word toward the prospect of electing her.

But we're talking about Hillary Clinton here, a woman who has, herself, fed this lie to the public. Clinton from Sept. 2017:

"...when I lost to Barack Obama, I immediately turned around, I endorsed him, I worked for him, I convinced my supporters to vote for him. I didn't get the same respect from my primary opponent."

Clinton on Anderson Cooper's CNN show:

"...in '08, we ran a much closer, tougher primary contest between President Obama and myself. It was really close. And I immediately endorsed him, and I went to work for him. I spent countless hours, Anderson, convincing my supporters who felt equally aggrieved that they had to support Barack Obama... I didn't get that same, you know, respect and reciprocity from Senator Sanders or from his supporters."

And from that podcast--the one in which Clinton suggests Sanders didn't unify the party in 2016:

"I know what it's like to lose a hard-fought primary. Y'know, I got more votes than Barack Obama but fewer delegates. I immediately ended my campaign, I endorsed him, I appeared with him, I went to the convention, where my delegates really wanted to cast their votes for me because they'd worked really hard for me, and I said 'no, I'm gonna' go to the floor of the convention, I'm gonna' move his nomination by acclimation,' then I did 100 events for him, ok. Contrast that to what did not happen in 2016. And that cannot happen again."

For the record, almost none of that is true.[1] Clinton didn't do "100 events" for Obama in 2008 (or a fraction of that), and Sanders did more work for her--more than 40 appearances in support of her campaign, at a pace that was remarkable for someone his age.

That list, created and circulated to refute Clinton cult smears, isn't complete. In researching the matter, Matt Binder, an enterprising Twitterer, managed to find even more. He put them into a compact, effective video that should be the final word on that particular subject. Sanders worked his ass off to try to elect Clinton, when he could have--and maybe should have--just given her the "oh, piss off" she so richly deserved. Years worth of ugly barbs and insufferably entitled ingratitude from Clinton and her cult are the thanks he's gotten.

Despite the grave offense Clinton's unconscionable attacks give to anyone with any functional sense of decency, it's Clinton who is treated respectfully by the Democratic party Establishment and the press, Clinton who is made the subject of a mammoth 4-part docu-series monument to her own malignant narcissism, and when Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a Sanders supporter, boos Clinton at a public event in reaction to Clinton's attacks, it is Tlaib who is pressured into apologizing. Most Americans hate Clinton[2] but this isn't reflected in the version of political discourse Americans receive from their institutions.

That version is, among other things, anti-Sanders and anti-progressive to such a degree that it often resembles satire. Sanders is relentlessly tone-policed by the Clintonite right and its press lackeys. Joe Biden can spend months attacking Medicare For All using the anti-M4A talking-points of entrenched industry and of even Donald Trump[3] and his attacks are amplified by a sympathetic press but when Sanders offers even the mildest criticism of Joe Biden's support for the Iraq war--even while Biden was doling out Trump-level lies aimed at covering up his record--he's being "divisive." Sanders supporter Zephyr Teachout wrote an editorial about Biden's corruption problem but though Teachout doesn't actually work for Sanders or his campaign and nothing she wrote was at all inaccurate, Sanders was pressured into apologizing for the piece. Biden expressed his gratitude by firing off an attack-ad falsely claiming Sanders was lying about his dismal record on Social Security. When Elizabeth Warren's campaign apparently leaked the absurd claim that Sanders had once privately told Warren he didn't think a woman could be elected president--something no one with any knowledge of Sanders genuinely believes--Sanders called this a lie. At the Iowa Democratic debate, the "journalist" who asked about it treated the charge as if it was an established fact, and Sanders was widely treated as the aggressor in the affair.[4] Every campaign--and pretty much everything--draws a certain number of noxious fans to social media; Sanders is the only one regularly denounced for his, the only Democratic candidate whose supporters are ubiquitously--and falsely--denounced as "sexists" and "racists," the only one condemned for not reigning them in, as if such a thing was necessary or even possible.

Within Democratic circles, the only reason attacks like those offered by Clinton can be received as anything other than an utter scandal is because Sanders' contributions to the Democratic party--not just his contributions to the Clinton campaign, already covered--are largely unknown, thus unacknowledged and unappreciated.

Those contributions are quite extensive but there doesn't seem to be a single article devoted to comprehensively cataloging them. That consideration is a big part of what gave birth to this project--an effort to cover this subject.

A few words about the parameters: In researching it, I quickly discovered a comprehensive treatment was beyond my resources. Among other things, while Sanders' higher-profile activities like televised town hall events can be tracked down with relative ease, many of his less-visible efforts have left barely a trace in the documentary record. The same is also--and especially--true of Sanders' activities prior to his first presidential race, and I've opted, as a consequence, to focus on his post-2016 work. Sanders has crafted a virtual universe of progressive legislation in the period covered but I've left that aside to focus on his political, rather than legislative, activities. While I've included some of Sanders' work on behalf of other candidates and while some of the events I've covered also involved such work, I haven't compiled a full accounting of it, and that's both to keep things manageable and because the existing record--the part of it within my reach, at least--appears to be inadequate to that task. All of which reinforces the original point: the story of Sanders' work on behalf of the Democrats is untold. While I can't cover all of it, I can certainly give some sense of the scope and the scale of it.


BERNIE SANDERS: A STARTER KIT

Sanders is an anti-Establishment kind of guy. He looks to upend the status quo and this leads some simple souls to see him as some sort of Trump figure, a chaos-bringer who only wants to burn down everything. Clintonite-rightists speak of him in terms of "horsehshoe theory." In theory, this is the notion that the extremes of left and right eventually become largely indistinguishable. In reality, it's the inability of the politically unsophisticated to distinguish an arsonist from an architect. Sanders is very specific in both what he supports and what he opposes. His "revolution" doesn't bring down the pillars of heaven; it's one that occurs firmly within the existing system. The Establishment to which he's opposed isn't, as is so often asserted by those more emotional than attentive, "Democrats" or "the Democratic party." It's an entrenched economic elite that enriches itself at the expense of the public and the public good. Democratic elected officials of the Clintonite-right variety, who currently control the major organs of the party, are some of the agents of that elite, piously mouthing progressive bromides in order to attract votes while selling out their constituents at every turn to their big-money donors. Sanders denounces the system as corrupt but not, for better or worse, the individuals within it. He adopts an old liberal idea--that institutions should serve people, not vice-versa--and seeks to tear down a politics that mostly just serves the needs of the powerful and build one in its place that is responsive to the needs of the people. The Democratic party was, as Sanders sees it, once the natural home of this politics[5] and needs to be again.

Some basic premises:

1) Often characterized as "far left," the progressive populist agenda adopted by Sanders is, in fact, a mainstream view in America and extremely popular with the public. Polling shows most of the headline items in that agenda have strong majority support, many quite significant majority support.[6]

2) That agenda is not only a mainstream view within the Democratic base, support for its headline items is overwhelming--usually 80% or better.

3) Sanders has pointed out that people don't feel represented by the major parties and argues those parties have failed to reach out to most voters in a meaningful way. Sanders argues for a Democratic party that is responsive to the needs of the people, not just a handful of well-heeled donors, and that offers a positive agenda that people support and that would make their lives better, rather than just being something less awful than the other side. Sanders' struggle within the Democratic party is to try to make it more representative of its own voters, which is, after all, what a party in a democracy is supposed to be.

4) Successful politics involve building coalitions and encouraging an energizing progressive movement has been his major political project. Such a movement, he has argued, will will mobilize existing voters, who have too often fallen into lesser-of-two-evils thinking when it comes to casting their ballots. It will draw in many of the enormous body of non-voters who either never become involved or have withdrawn from the process in disgust because they don't think anyone represents their interests. It can even draw in Republicans and others who may disagree with portions of a progressive populist agenda but find other parts of it appealing. A major theme of Sanders' work has, in fact, been outreach to Republicans. Red states are often badly neglected by Democrats; Sanders has argued "Democrats need to become a 50-state party. You can't have a great party on the West Coast and the East Coast. You need to have a party in all 50 states. That's not the case right now."


LEGWORK

Sanders believes this is a winning approach. Not just for one election but for establishing a new status quo, a progressive one.

In pursuit of that, Sanders has spent years traveling across the U.S. on behalf of progressive Democratic policies and candidates, often maintaining a pace that would be crippling for a lot of men half his age. A 2014 Daily Beast article, written before Sanders' first presidential run and rise to national prominence, sets the tone nicely. In what would become a long-running pattern by perplexed journalists, the author, David Freedlander, largely misses the point of Sanders' activities by trying to interpret them as merely a presidential campaign and is left scratching his head.

"[A] review of [Sanders] campaign schedule reveals a highly unorthodox approach in the pre-primary presidential process.

"There was a fundraiser for Keith Ellison, the Minnesota congressman who is one of the most consistently liberal members of the House and who routinely wins election by 50 points or more (and who faces only token opposition this year). Sanders also fundraised and campaigned for Gloria Bromell Tinubu, a former member of the Georgia state legislature who is making her second run for Congress in deeply conservative South Carolina after losing in 2012 to Rep. Tim Rice by 14 points.

"In tiny Richmond, California, Sanders has gotten involved in the battle for control of the city council, a campaign that has received little mainstream media attention but has become a touchstone in progressive circles. There, lawmakers are engaged in a fight with Chevron over the oil giant’s plans to upgrade a local refinery and a group of local progressives has been trying to keep the city council under their control against a slate of business-backed candidates.

"More than 500 people attended a rally that Sanders headlined in Richmond. He is the only national political figure to get involved.... [Sanders has] twice held rallies and town halls for the South Carolina Progressive Network, an umbrella group of grassroots organizations that tries to move the Palmetto State’s politics leftward. He keynoted the Fighting Bobfest, an annual gathering in central Wisconsin dedicated to the memory of the early-20th-century Senator Robert La Follette... [H]e has made the rounds to local Democratic parties, hosting a fundraiser for the Hillsborough County Democratic Committee in New Hampshire (the first primary’s state Democratic senator, Jeanne Shaheen, was a no-show) and keynoting the Clinton County Democratic Hall of Fame Dinner in Goose Lake, Iowa. He has hosted town halls at the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers union hall in Jackson, Mississippi, and fundraisers at the AFSCME headquarters in Philadelphia and a longshoreman’s hall in Charleston, South Carolina.

"In an interview with Esquire magazine, Sanders explained that this approach was consistent with his belief that the two major political parties have failed to reach out to most voters... The Vermont senator has given out more than $200,000 through his two PACs, Friends of Bernie and Progressive Voters of America. The PVA, in turn, has donated tens of thousands of dollars to embattled red-state Democrats like Mark Begich of Alaska, Kay Hagan of North Carolina, and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana."

In June 2015, a few weeks after entering that cycle's presidential race, Sanders fired off a letter to the chairman of the Democratic National Committee offering some of his ideas on party presidential debates in the upcoming campaign. For only two pages, it's an extraordinary document and incorporates many elements of Sanders' approach to politics. Sanders suggests a robust debate schedule, arguing that this would encourage voter interest and turnout. "[T]he purpose of our campaign should be to encourage as much voter participation as possible." In 2008, "an engaged and vigorous nominating process was one of the keys to success in registering voters early on and convincing people they had a meaningful stake in the general election in November." In a particularly visionary stroke, he suggested trying to organize inter-party debates, with the Democratic candidates taking on the Republican candidates, which, he argued, would, among other things, "engage large numbers of voters who typically do not pay attention to the process until much later when the general election begins to come into focus." His remarks on the need to address neglected states:

"Further, I also think it is important for us to debate not only in the early states but also in many states which currently do not have much Democratic presidential campaign activity. While a number of these non-target states have not in the past had much organized campaign presence, I believe it is critical for the Democratic Party and progressive forces in America to engage voters in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. By expanding the scope geographically of debates beyond the early calendar states we can begin to awaken activism at the grassroots level in those states and signal to Democrats and progressives in places like Texas, Mississippi, Utah, and Wyoming that their states are not forgotten by the Democratic Party."

All of Sanders' suggestions regarding the debate schedule were, of course, entirely ignored.

When Sanders took his presidential campaign to these neglected states though, he found a warm reception. Zalid Jilani at Alternet noted at the time that a Sanders speech in Phoenix, Arizona was one of the biggest political rallies in the city's history.

"Bernie is campaigning across the Southwest to show he has broader appeal than just the safe blue-state regions of the country. It is an echo of the swing through the South that Sanders did in 2013, when he was still considering his candidacy.

"'I really strongly disagree with this concept that there's a blue state and red state America,' he told In These Times in an interview that year. "I believe that in every state in the country the vast majority of the people are working people. These are people who are struggling to keep their heads above water economically, these are people who want Social Security defended, they want to raise the minimum wage, they want changes in our trade policy. And to basically concede significant parts of America, including the South, to the right-wing is to me not only stupid politics, but even worse than that--you just do not turn your backs on millions and millions of working people."

Sanders' presidential campaign deflated the conventional wisdom that a "far-left" candidate who calls himself a democratic socialist couldn't possibly draw votes from the Republicans. After his defeat, 6-12% of his primary voters went on to vote for Donald Trump's faux-populism in the general election. Clintonites have latched on to this factoid to disingenuously blame Sanders for Trump's election but, as John Sides, research director of the Democracy Fund Voter Study Group, wrote in the Washington Post, this contingent of Sanders voters "weren't really Democrats to begin with."

Trump won the presidency running a right-wing faux-populist campaign that played on racial and ethnic hatreds but, as some noted at the time, he also ran to Hillary Clinton's left on some key issues like anti-corruption and, most importantly, "free trade." Trump secured the presidency by heavily touring key Rust Belt states that have been devastated by decades of horrendous trade agreements and promising to put an end to such practices. As with so most of what Trump says, this was just bullshit, a conclusion his subsequent presidency has even more strongly reinforced, but it made him the only source of hope in a contest against Hillary Clinton, who had spent decades pushing for those ruinous policies on behalf of her big donors.

Sanders' own quest for the 2016 Democratic nomination had been historic. He'd been the first Jewish person to win a major-party primary in the U.S.--an accomplishment almost universally overlooked as a consequence of the Clintonite right's insistence on treating him as "just another old white guy" for the purpose of waging weaponized identity attacks against him. More importantly, Sanders drove a stake through the heart of one of the foundational myths of the Clintonite right, the idea that Democrats have to perpetually move to the right in order to suck up the big bucks from big-money sources or they'll be unable to compete with Republicans, who gleefully wallow in such corruption. "Unilateral disarmament" is how they described swearing off the bribery-and-donor-service system, even as, in many cases (like Clinton's), they pretended to oppose it. In 2016, Sanders rejected this and funded his campaign, instead, with small donations from ordinary people. Far from being wiped out, he raised nearly as much money as Clinton, who was the legacy candidate of one of the major political machines in the U.S. and aggressively prostituted her potential future administration to every well-heeled interest. After 2016, candidates opting for the old, corrupt approach do so only because they prefer the corruption.

After the end of Sanders' 2016 primary campaign, his supporters founded a new group, Our Revolution, which described its mission thusly:

"Through supporting a new generation of progressive leaders, empowering millions to fight for progressive change and elevating the political consciousness, Our Revolution will transform American politics to make our political and economic systems once again responsive to the needs of working families."

OR has carried out this mission over the last few years with--in a part of their mission that is widely misunderstood and/or misrepresented--a particular focus on state and local elections. The org is helping build a bench of future progressive leaders.

Days after Trump won the election, Sanders published "Our Revolution," which is partly a memoir of his presidential run, but most of the book outlines what Sanders describes as "an agenda for a new America"--the agenda on which he'd run. The book became a bestseller and made Sanders wealthy. The agenda became the center of policy discussion within the national party. After making Sanders a member of the Senate Democratic leadership, congressional Democrats initially tried to coopt it. The 2018 congressional election cycle saw the emergence of an extraordinary number of "Berniecrat" candidates around the U.S., giving full-throated support for it. All of the major 2020 Democratic presidential candidates have made a big show of trying to copy portions of it.

Sanders has promoted progressive policies and been a strong voice of opposition to Trumpism through a series of primetime townhall events and debates on CNN and MSNBC that played out across 2017. The first, in January, touched on a wide range of issues. The next, in February, was a debate with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) over "The Future of Obamacare," which Trump had promised to gut, and proved a big ratings winner.

Sanders strongly argues that Democrats shouldn't cede red states to Republicans without a fight. In his travels, Sanders makes a particular point of visiting such states, challenging Trump and the Republicans on their own turf. In February, MSNBC scheduled a townhall event with Sanders in McDowell County, West Virginia. This is the poorest part of WV, the population has the lowest life-expectancy in the U.S.--only 64 years--and Trump carried it in 2016 by over 74%. The event initially had to be rescheduled when the local National Guard armory canceled it at the last minute. It happened a few weeks later in March. That old devil Conventional Wisdom holds that someone like "far left" Sanders would be met with hostility and deep skepticism in such a locale. Instead, Sanders' progressive message was greeted by enthusiasm and cheers.

"[A]s he did in his Kenosha, Wisconsin talk earlier this year, Sanders succeeded where so many Democrats failed this past election cycle—by connecting with red-state voters."

That same month, Sanders also traveled to Mississippi to support Nissan autoworkers who have been waging a long-running effort to unionize.

"A win at Nissan could be a game-changer. On Saturday, they had a guest speaker.

"'If we can win here at Nissan, you will give a tremendous bolt of confidence to working people all over this country,' Bernie Sanders told a crowd of 5,000. 'If you can stand up to a powerful multinational corporation in Canton, Mississippi, workers all over this country will say, "We can do it, too".'"

In April, Sanders embarked on a "Unity Tour," a project he carried out in cooperation with the Democratic National Committee.

"Beginning April 17, Sanders and [DNC chief Tom] Perez will hit the trail in so-called 'red' and 'purple' states, including Kentucky, Maine, Florida, Utah, Montana, Nevada, Arizona and Nebraska."

Sanders later donated $100,000 to the DNC to defray the expenses of that tour.

In May, Sanders traveled to California and stumped for a state-level single-payer bill then making its way through the state legislature.

"Sen. Bernie Sanders, assailing Republicans in Washington for their health care bill, delivered a message Saturday to the Democratic-controlled California Legislature: 'Please lead the country and pass the single-payer bill.'

"'Please make my life easier,' Sanders, who is proposing Medicare for All, single-payer legislation at the federal level, said in a speech in Beverly Hills where he was accepting an award from the nonprofit Consumer Watchdog. 'The great state of California can send a message that will be heard all over this country and all over the world if you pass single-payer here.'... Sanders did not delve into policy specifics Saturday. Instead, he continued to confront Republican President Donald Trump for helping lead the effort to repeal the federal health care law. Sanders, seizing on recent remarks by Trump, said he agrees with the president that Australia’s universal health care is superior to the one in the United States, remarks the White House later cast as merely complimentary.

"'Everybody is right once in a while,' Sanders said to laughs. 'And on this particular instance, Trump is quite right.'

"'So, let me say to the president that if you think the Australian health care system is so good, well, I am going to give you the opportunity to support Legislation that I am going to introduce.'"

The same month, Montana was to hold a special election to fill the state's lone House seat, which had been vacated by Rep. Ryan Zinke after Trump appointed him Secretary of the Interior. Sanders traveled to the state for a tour in support of Rob Quist, the Democratic candidate in that race, whom Sanders had endorsed.

A few days later, Sanders was on CNN again, this time taking part in a townhall debate with Ohio Gov. John Kasich on "The White House In Crisis."

When Republicans were scheming to replace the Affordable Care Act with their awful "Trumpcare" legislation, Sanders took the lead in defending the ACA. A Vox article from 7 Aug. details how Sanders and his team repeatedly delayed the roll-out of his latest iteration of his Medicare For All proposal, prioritizing preservation of Obamacare.

"[D]uring the Obamacare repeal fight in Congress, Sanders was a team player. He brought crowds to dozens of rallies with Senate Democrats who had once opposed him. He shut a Republican attempt to expose Democrats’ divisions, despite the interest of some of his team. And, perhaps most importantly, he marshaled his resources and newfound star power in defense of Democrats’ top priority: showing what it might look like for his movement to be incorporated into the party apparatus, rather than having it try to knock down its gates.

"'Our job today is to defend the Affordable Care Act,' Sanders said at several of his rallies this year. 'Our job tomorrow is to create a Medicare-for-all single-payer system.'... On January 15, as temperatures hit the low teens, Sanders joined Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (NY) and Michigan Sens. Debbie Stabenow and Gary Peters onstage at Macomb County Community College. Eight thousand people showed up.

"'Sanders knew he had a unique megaphone in American politics, and he used it to shout it at the top of his lungs at a time when few were paying attention to the health care fight,' said Ben Wikler, Washington director of MoveOn.org.

"He kept shouting. In Portland, Maine, long before Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) proved a crucial health care 'no' vote, about 1,000 people watched Sanders decry the bill... For two days in June, his team and its gray van traveled 348 miles in Appalachia to build public opposition to the Republican health bill.

"Activists say that proved a crucial step in showing Democratic lawmakers that the public would join them in fighting for the ACA."

July saw Sanders back on the road defending the ACA. From the Atlantic:

"West Virginia was the senator’s first stop on a day-long, two-state trip to campaign against the Senate Republican health-care bill. Next up was Covington, Kentucky, a city near Cincinnati, Ohio, where Sanders called the health-care bill House Republicans passed in May 'the most anti-working class legislation that I have ever seen,' adding that 'the Senate bill, in many respects, is even worse.'

"It’s unusual for a high-profile progressive politician to hold a rally in a red state like Kentucky, or even West Virginia, a former Democratic stronghold that has trended conservative in recent years, outside of a presidential campaign. That may be part of the reason why the Democratic Party’s power has eroded so severely across the country."

Further details from the New Yorker, 31 July, 2017:

"Since the election, [Sanders] has staged events in Michigan, Mississippi, Maine, West Virginia, Arizona, Nevada, Ohio, Kentucky, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Montana, Florida, Iowa, Maryland, and Illinois. At every one, he speaks about the suffering of small-town Americans, and his belief that the Democrats can help them... For decades, Sanders has argued for a single-payer health-care system, and he is getting ready to introduce a 'Medicare for All' bill in the Senate. This summer, however, he assigned himself the task of leading the campaign against efforts, by Republicans in the House and the Senate, to repeal the Affordable Care Act. On the Sunday after the Fourth of July, as Senate Republicans prepared to release their bill, Sanders took a charter flight from Burlington to West Virginia and Kentucky, for a pair of hastily arranged rallies. He and his staff had chosen states whose Republican senators were pivotal in the health-care debate. Kentucky’s Mitch McConnell, the Majority Leader, was shepherding the bill toward a vote without any public hearings. Rand Paul, of Kentucky, and Shelley Moore Capito, of West Virginia, were indicating that they might vote against it.

"Sanders talked about the Senate bill’s likely effects in McConnell’s home state. 'How do you throw two hundred and thirty thousand people off the health care they have without hesitation?' he asked. 'It happens because the Democratic Party is incredibly weak in states like Kentucky. And so he doesn’t have to face the wrath of the voters.'"

August saw another tour, this one through Indiana, Ohio and Michigan in support of a variety of progressive issues:

"...Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is gearing up for his three-state Midwest 'Pickup Tour,' which will aim to demonstrate that his ambitious progressive agenda--which includes a $15 federal minimum wage, Medicare for All, and tuition-free public college--has 'universal appeal.'"

Near the end of the month, Sanders published "Bernie Sanders' Guide To Political Revolution," a book aimed at teens and calling them to "fight for a progressive economic, environmental, racial, and social justice agenda that creates jobs, raises wages, protects the environment, and provides healthcare for all."

On 26 Sept., 2017, CNN hosted a townhall debate on healthcare, featuring Sanders and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) vs. Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA). Sanders mopped the floor with his Republican opponents.

Toward the end of September, Trump had announced a plan for tax cuts, primarily benefiting the already-well-off. A few weeks later, on 18 Oct., CNN staged a rematch debate between Sanders and Ted Cruz, this one over tax reform. A few days later, Sanders trekked to Massachusetts to stump for a slate of local Dem candidates:

"U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders brought his strategy of trying to reenergize the Democratic Party by lending his star power to lower-level races to a small city just outside Boston on Monday, with a stop to endorse candidates for alderman and city council.

"Sanders... announced his support for a dozen candidates backed by 'Our Revolution' a group formed by supporters of Sanders’ campaign to boost progressive, liberal candidates.

"It is unusual for a politician with Sanders’ profile to weigh in on races with no serious Republican contenders, political observers said.

"'The local level, more than any other level, is a way to involve people in the political process,' Sanders said in Somerville, Massachusetts, a city of 80,000 people.

"Sanders last week pointed to the appearance as one of a series to try to build enthusiasm for lower-level elections."

In November, Sanders carried out a multi-state tour in opposition to the Trump tax-cut proposal:

"Sen. Bernie Sanders is traveling to Kentucky, Ohio and Pennsylvania this weekend to rally against the Republican tax bill... Sanders, who held a similar series of rallies across the country this year to oppose the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, is using the 'Protecting Working Families Tour,' which is also organized by MoveOn.org and the Not One Penny coalition, to pressure on-the-fence GOP senators before a vote on the tax bill, President Donald Trump's top legislative priority."

On 28 Nov., CNN again tackled the question of Trump's tax-cut plan in a debate featuring Sanders and Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) vs. Ted Cruz and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC).

In 2018, Sanders began an extraordinary run of townhall events of his own, carried out in cooperation with the Young Turks and other progressive outlets and streamed live over the internet. His first, in January, was concerned with Medicare For All healthcare and featured many M4A advocates and experts charting the problems of existing U.S. healthcare, the experience of other nations with single-payer healthcare, etc. It ran nearly 2 hours and drew 1.1 million live viewers, with another 1.6 million tuning in the next morning.

Congressional Republicans had passed and Trump had signed into law his tax-cut bill in December. In February, Sanders responded with the "Repeal the Trump Tax" tour.

"Sen. Bernie Sanders will join progressive groups in Iowa, Wisconsin and Michigan next week as part of a nationwide campaign to drum up grassroots opposition against the new Republican-backed tax law ahead of the midterm elections.

"The Vermont independent will take direct aim at Trump-era Republicans' signature legislative achievement in those three key states, two of which, Michigan and Wisconsin, were instrumental in the President's 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton."

In March, with Sanders on the road again, CNN reported that "Sanders is spending a lot of time in Trump country."

"The Vermont independent has spent the 19 months since President Donald Trump's election bouncing around the country, rallying support against Trump and the Republican Congress, stumping for progressive candidates, promoting a book, and appearing alongside Democratic National Committee leaders on a nationwide 'unity tour.'

"Since the last ballots were cast in 2016, Sanders has visited some 28 states (not counting his home in Vermont), often headlining multiple events in different cities over the course of just a few hours. He's made three stops in, yes, Iowa, but also two apiece in Kansas, Kentucky, Florida, Wisconsin and New York, the only one of the bunch won by Hillary Clinton.

"This coming week he will drop in (again) on both Texas and Arizona, where he's first scheduled for an interview with CNN's Jake Tapper at South By Southwest in Austin on Friday before heading down to an event hosted by his political organization, Our Revolution, that night in San Antonio. Sanders hits Lubbock for another Our Revolution rally on Saturday, then skips west Sunday to join Reps. Ruben Gallego and Raúl Grijalva in Phoenix.By the time he returns back east next week, Sanders will have touched down in six states, five of them carried by Trump, over the course of a little more than two weeks. The whirlwind itinerary suggests Sanders is a man in a hurry. But even if the destination remains uncertain, the message is clear and, he insists, targeted.

"'We have put a significant effort into going into states that Trump won,' Sanders said in an interview. 'Not exclusively, but most of the states that I've visited have been states that Trump won. The reason for that is I think it's important for people who voted for Trump to understand that many of the promises that he made on health care, on taxes, on many other issues, are promises that he did not keep.'"

Politico noticed this too.

"Bernie Sanders is taking his pitch to Trump country... 'It's absolutely imperative that we get out to those states that Trump won, speak to the working people of those states, and make very clear that the campaign that Trump won on--where he promised to stand for working people--turned out to be a lie,' Sanders told POLITICO in an interview Thursday, shortly before taking off for Texas and Arizona, two states the president carried by single digits in the 2016 presidential election.

"'It's important to rally people around the progressive agenda, which says that we don’t give tax breaks to billionaires,' Sanders said, promising to add even more Trump-voting states to his travel schedule."[7]

On 19 March, Sanders held his next townhall event, this one on "Inequality in America."

"Tonight, Sen. Bernie Sanders, in partnership with The Guardian, NowThis, The Young Turks and Act.tv, will present a live town hall event on the rise of the oligarchy and the collapse of the American middle class. Sanders will speak with director Michael Moore, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, economist Darrick Hamilton and other guests about the 40-year decline of the middle class and possible solutions to the growing crisis of income and wealth inequality in America."

The event was another success, drawing 1.7 million live viewers, with 2.5 million watching it the next day.

May saw a two-day tour of Pennsylvania:

"With the same enthusiasm and populist appeals that defined his presidential run, Bernie Sanders told thousands of supporters in Lancaster that Democrats like Jess King are an essential part of his 'political revolution.'

"'Jess King is on board,' Sanders said, with a Medicare-for-all national health care system, with raising the minimum wage and with fighting efforts to cut Social Security.

"She supports criminal justice reform, 'commons sense' gun safety measures and taxing the rich.

"Those were among the reasons why Sanders, the two-term U.S. Senator from Vermont, said he was backing King in her uphill battle for the 11th Congressional District--an area that President Donald Trump won by 26 points in 2016.

"'We need Jess because her vision of America is a very different vision than the Republican leadership and Donald Trump, who now control our government,' Sanders said on a sunny Saturday morning in Lancaster city’s Musser Park... His trip here was part of a two-day Pennsylvania tour to visit three candidates--the others being lieutenant governor candidate John Fetterman and 7th Congressional District candidate Greg Edwards."

And:

"Espousing themes of economic equality and social justice, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders brought his 'political revolution' to Allentown Saturday to rally Democrats behind community organizer Greg Edwards in the Lehigh Valley's high-profile congressional race.

"Sanders, who shared the stage at a packed Miller Symphony Hall with Edwards, vouched for the congressional hopeful's commitment to 'progressive' policies such as universal health care, debt-free education and a higher minimum wage.

"Sanders urged the audience to vote in the May 15 primary and reach across the aisle to those who supported Republican President Donald Trump. He said many Trump voters are hurting, too, because they cannot afford health care and are having a tough time making ends meet."

That same month, Trump announced he was withdrawing the U.S. from the Iran nuclear agreement negotiated during the Obama administration which was aimed at preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons. A week later, Sanders hosted his 3rd townhall event, this one on the nuclear deal and America's role in the world.

With June came a tour of California:

"Sanders will make four stops in southern California next Saturday, June 2, just days before the state's closely watched primary elections on June 5... Sanders will speak to protesting workers and rally with activists.

"His packed day will start with a roundtable with Disneyland workers in Anaheim, where unions are pushing a ballot measure that would raise wages for hospitality workers at companies that have received subsidies from the city.

"Then Sanders will hold a town hall with dockworkers near the Port of Long Beach.

"After that, he'll head to downtown Los Angeles for a rally with Shaun King and Patrisse Cullors, two prominent activists affiliated with the Black Lives Matter movement. More than 3,500 people have RSVP'd online to attend the event."

In July, Sanders undertook a 4-state tour on behalf of several Democratic candidates. Pennsylvania:

"Vermont senator Bernie Sanders headlined a stage full of progressive candidates at Carnegie Mellon University on Sunday. The campaign event was billed as a rally to support Braddock mayor John Fetterman’s candidacy for lieutenant governor.

"Fetterman and Sanders were joined by Sara Innamorato and Summer Lee. The two Democratic Socialist candidates, running on progressive agendas, won strong primary victories in May. The overall message of the rally was that progressive politics is a winning strategy.

"Sanders said during his speech: 'Raising the minimum wage, healthcare for all, making public colleges and universities tuition free, protecting Roe versus Wade, transforming our energy system, criminal justice reform, immigration reform, on all of those issues, the American people are with us.'"

Minnesota:

"Over 15,000 people packed into First Avenue to hear Sen. Bernie Sanders rally for Rep. Keith Ellison, who is running for Minnesota attorney general."

Wisconsin:

"Former presidential hopeful and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders was in Janesville Saturday evening to campaign for Randy Bryce, a Democratic candidate for the 1st Congressional District.

"Several hundred supporters turned out for the rally, where Bryce and Sanders emphasized their populist message, including calling for single-payer healthcare for all Americans and immigration reform.

"In his speech, Sanders characterized Bryce as a candidate who doesn’t rely on big political donors.

"'What this campaign is about and what Randy is about is saying enough is enough. We are going to have a government that represents all people and not just the 1 percent,' Sanders said."

At the end of June, Berniecrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez won a major upset victory over Rep. Joe Crowley (D-NY), the 4th-ranking Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives, and became an instant rock-star among progressive Democrats. After Sanders' trip to Wisconsin, she headed to Kansas to join Sanders in campaigning for Democratic congressional candidates:

"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) will make campaign swing through Kansas next week, rallying for two congressional candidates who argue that left-wing politics are the key to winning in red states.

"'I've believed for years that the Democratic Party has committed political malpractice by writing off half the states in this country,' said Sanders in an interview, as he campaigned in Minnesota for Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.). 'They've got to fight for every state in this country.'

"Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez will head to Kansas on July 20. They’ll begin in Wichita, where James Thompson, who narrowly lost a special election in 2017, wants another chance to win the 4th Congressional District. They’ll continue with an event in the Kansas City suburbs for Brent Welder, a former Sanders delegate now seeking the Democratic nomination in the 3rd Congressional District.

On 16 July, Sanders hosted his 4th townhall event, "CEOs vs. Workers." Sanders invited low-wage workers from five major corporations, along with the CEOs of those same corporations. None of the latter showed up.

"On Monday night, Vermont senator Bernie Sanders hosted a live-streamed town hall with five low-wage workers--one each from Amazon, American Airlines, Disney, McDonald’s, and Walmart. The workers sat on one side of the stage, while on the other idled five empty chairs, each emblazoned with the name of an absent CEO. Sanders had invited the executives to participate in the discussion, but none had agreed.

"The arrangement was an effective visual representation of the outrageous inequality that exists in the United States. The ten chairs represented ten people: five workers struggling to make ends meet, and their five indifferent bosses, too preoccupied to bother attending and too powerful to be compelled."

August saw a three-stop tour across Sanders' home state of Vermont in which Sanders appeared with ALS-afflicted activist Ady Barkan to promote healthcare reform. Then, it was down to Florida, to stump for Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, whom Sanders had endorsed in Democratic gubernatorial primary. After Sanders' intervention, Gillum surged from 4th to 1st place and won the nomination in an upset.

October, the lead-up to the midterm congressional elections, saw Sanders very busy:

"Senator Bernie Sanders will hit the campaign trail hard this month, stumping for left-leaning candidates at 15 planned events in nine states. Along the planned route are a number of locales the Vermont Senator will need to visit if he plans to run for president in 2020.

"Sanders will campaign on behalf of Liz Watson in Bloomington, Indiana, J.D. Scholten, who is trying to beat Republican Representative Steve King, in Iowa and Representative Barbara Lee in Oakland, California. Between stump speeches, he'll hold a rally on behalf of his PAC, Our Revolution, in South Carolina and town halls to discuss Social Security cuts in Iowa and Indiana.

"Sanders, 77, will also hit Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona, Colorado and Nevada on his October tour of presidential swing states."

And:

"[Sanders has] been promoting the party’s prospects in the Nov. 6 elections during a nine-state campaign swing that began in Bloomington, Indiana, on Oct. 19 and wraps up in Oakland, California, this Saturday. He’ll be joined on that last stop by Rep. Barbara Lee of California, a fellow progressive stalwart running for chair of the House Democratic Caucus."

ABC News reports that,

"Notably, the list of candidates for [which Sanders will be stumping during] this swing includes some true-blue progressives, as well as more moderate Democrats who do not agree with Sanders on all policy prescriptions. The senator, for example, will campaign with the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, though he campaigned for one of her challengers in the primary.

"Jacky Rosen, the Democratic Senate candidate in Nevada, also sticks out."

Details of this tour:

The 2018 congressional elections saw a blue wave lift Democrats to control of the House of Representatives and washed away several Clintonite-right "Democrats" in the Senate.

On 27 Nov., Sanders published "Where We Go From Here," a chronicle of his activities from the end of his 2016 primary campaign to the then-present.

In December, Sanders hosts his next townhall event, "Solving the Climate Crisis."

January 2019 saw a tour of South Carolina. ABC News reported:

"[Sanders] held several events around Martin Luther King Day including a private meal and meet and greet at Big T's Barbecue, a popular black-owned and operated soul food restaurant with 'Our Revolution,' a political non-profit formed by Sanders supporters following his 2016 campaign.

"During his visit to Columbia, South Carolina, Sanders also ratcheted up his rhetoric during stops at Benedict College, a historically black college and Zion Baptist Church, a historic African-American church... While at Benedict, Sanders told a standing room only crowd of over 250 African-American students on Tuesday that President Donald Trump was 'unamerican and absolutely disgraceful.' Sanders also told the students that the Republican Party is a 'right-wing extremist party.'

"Sanders made headlines at the NAACP rally at the South Carolina State House by calling Trump a 'racist,' an attack line that Sanders has used several times over the course of Trump’s political career... On Martin Luther King Day, the South Carolina NAACP held a town hall at Zion Baptist Church. The group reportedly invited Sanders and [Sen. Cory] Booker but Sanders was the only 2020 potential candidate to attend the event... In addition to his remarks to the Legislative Black Caucus on Tuesday, Sanders also spoke to the State’s Democratic caucus about the wealth gap, health care, taxes."

In February 2019, Sanders launched his second presidential campaign, which seems like a logical place to stop. Or perhaps to start.

Sanders has certainly continued his activities right into his presidential campaign. A few words are perhaps in order regarding a ridiculous "controversy" ginned up around that work. Sanders has, throughout his presidential campaign, continued to reach out to Republicans. In April, 2019, Sanders agreed to do a townhall event on Fox News. The decision was met with furious outrage by Clintonite right figures:

"Vermont Independent Senator Bernie Sanders angered many establishment Democrats... over his plans to appear at a Fox News 2020 presidential campaign town hall later this month.

"Sanders was widely ridiculed by Democrats and supporters of 2020 rivals including Beto O'Rourke, Kamala Harris and even former Vice President Joe Biden's unannounced campaign backers who used the announcement as evidence the Independent senator is not 'loyal' to the Democratic Party. While voices such as The Intercept's Glenn Greenwald applauded Sanders for his open-minded outreach, mainline Democrats accused Sanders of courting conservative voters, promoting the cable news network's 'hateful' Trump rhetoric and turning his back on the DNC... Sanders was also widely ridiculed by Democrats who view his very appearance on Fox News as an affront to the party and an embrace of hateful, Trump-led rhetoric."

Sanders didn't, of course, offer any "hateful, Trump-led rhetoric"; entering into the lion's den, he talked about the same progressive issues he has for years without altering a dot and was met--as he has been so often in such initially hostile venues--with raucous applause. The event drew 2.55 million viewers, becoming the most viewed political event of the cycle up to that date. End result: Sanders brought the progressive gospel to an audience that ordinarily never hears it.[8]

Hopefully, this article provides the proper context for those and many other complaints about Sanders so endlessly offered over so many years by the Clinton cult and the larger Clintonite right.

Acting more like an activist than a long-serving member of congress, Sanders has encouraged and assisted the creation of a massive and enthusiastic grassroots movement, the core of which are young people--the future--and has directed its energy toward supporting Democrats. No one else in national politics does what he does. The amount he gives of himself is extraordinary. Well past the age most people have retired from the rat-race, he lives, breathes, sweats and bleeds his politics, utilizing his renown to support Democratic candidates and policies, and he is, by any serious evaluation, an invaluable asset to that cause.

--j.

---

[1] Clinton didn't get more votes than Obama. Michigan moved the date of its primary in violation of DNC rules and the org decided any votes in that mischeduled contest would be invalid. The other candidates removed their names from the ballot. Clinton agreed with this decision until she started losing, in which case she argued for reinstating the vote from Michigan, where, she had, in effect, appeared on the ballot uncontested. Clinton's claim of getting more votes rests on those votes. Clinton didn't "immediately" end her campaign--like Sanders four years later, she played it out right to the end of the primary season. Clinton didn't magnanimously go into the convention and move Obama's nomination by acclimation; she allowed her supporters to threaten a walk-out of the convention in order to have her name placed in consideration for the nomination then waited until over 1,000 delegates had voted for her before removing her name from consideration.

[2] Most of the public, of course, hates Clinton. After her appalling blame-absolutely-everyone-else book-tour in 2017, her polling shows she's regarded more unfavorably by America than even Trump, even as America suffers through year three of the perpetual shit-show that is that particular regime. In the Harvard/Harris poll from the end of January--the most recent of which I'm aware--Clinton was at 57% unfavorable vs. only 54% unfavorable for Trump.

[3] I went into this in a somewhat lengthy profile of Biden a few months ago. The relevant portion:

A few weeks ago, Biden launched a crusade of lies intended to discredit and defeat M4A, employing many of the same "arguments" against it being advanced by Donald Trump. At an AARP forum in Iowa, Biden said that under M4A, "Medicare goes away as you know it. All the Medicare you have is gone." This is, of course, entirely false--M4A, as the name implies, just significantly expands the existing Medicare program--but it also mirrors what Trump wrote in an op-ed back in October devoted, in part, to attacking the policy. According to Trump, "so-called Medicare for All would really be Medicare for None. Under the Democrats' plan, today's Medicare would be forced to die." Biden has repeatedly employed Trump's Orwellian characterization of M4A as taking away health coverage, rather than expanding it. "[T]he Democrats would eliminate every American's private and employer-based health plan," wrote Trump. Biden:

"How many of you like your employer based healthcare? Do you think it was adequate? Now if I come along and say you’re finished, you can’t have it anymore, well that’s what Medicare for All does. You cannot have it. Period."

Trump appeals to the absolute worst, most selfish "got-mine" entitlement psychology. "[Medicare For All] means that after a life of hard work and sacrifice," he wrote, "seniors would no longer be able to depend on the benefits they were promised." Biden incorporates all of this--without attribution, of course--into his own recent anti-Medicare For All ad.

[4] In her Hollywood Reporter interview, Clinton herself tried this, accusing Sanders of "having gone after Elizabeth with a very personal attack on her."

[5] Sanders himself draws the lineage of his politics directly from Franklin D. Roosevelt, the giant Democrat of the 20th century. Arguably, of any century.

[6] The link there is to an article Mitch Clark and I assembled back in January of 2016 examining the polling on Sanders' major issues. It's now hopelessly out of date--on many of those issues, the public is now even more progressive--but it still appears to be the best compendium of that information.

[7] Politico, being Politico, tried to make a negative out of the fact that Sanders was doing this of his own initiative rather than at the direction of senior Democrats and was sour about the fact that Sanders was campaigning for two progressive congressmen but not more conservative candidates (the latter being a recurring--though, as this article suggests, false--theme in the anti-Sanders press).

[8] A similar "controversy" erupted in January when Joe Rogan, host of perhaps the most popular podcast in the world but a fellow noted for some less-than-enlightened views, sort-of endorsed Sanders' campaign, resulting in another round of manufactured outrage, attacks on Sanders by his presidential rivals and demands that Sanders apologize for "bolstering the endorsement."