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That’s Not How You Win, Bernie [1]
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Date: 2025-06-28
Once again, we see how Bernie Sanders was never a Democrat, doesn’t actually like Democrats, and is more concerned about his own ego than helping to stop Republicans. In the aftermath of Zohran Mamdani’s win in the Democratic primary in New York City, Sanders felt the need to go beyond praising his win and the campaign tactics used to get him the victory to stab Kamala Harris in the back:
“And if somebody like a Kamala Harris had not listened to her consultants and done that, she would be president of the United States today.”
Mr. Sanders: Are you sure you want to go there? You had the chance to become president of the United States and you couldn’t even get out of the primary. I know, I know: “It was rigged.” And yet, when we look at the numbers, there’s no there there. Hilary Clinton beat you in the Democratic primary by 3,707,303 votes.
That’s more than the 2,868,686 votes she beat The Convicted Felon by.
Harris won Vermont with 235,791 votes and 64.4% of the vote, making Vermont her strongest victory. That’s compared to your 229,429 votes in the same election.
More of your own constituents voted for Harris than for you, Mr. Sanders.
So when you come along and try to give advice to people about how to win elections, you might want to check your own track record. By all means, analyzing the results of this election and seeing how we might be able to learn from it in order to move forward for upcoming elections is a good thing. But how is this helpful? You do understand that winning in New York City is not the same as winning in Vermont, yes? That neither is the same as winning across the country, yes?
And how very telling that once again you are denigrating the Black woman. There’s a reason you have a race problem, Mr. Sanders. It isn’t that you’re as virulent as the Republicans screaming “DEI,” but your continued ignorance of how racism actually functions in our culture is no longer excusable.
The idea that Harris didn’t win because of “consultants” rather than the racism and sexism stacked against her is ludicrous. “But we elected Obama” is not a response.
And it’s not just with race and sex. Your focus upon class differences seems fixated simply on the axis of wealth and poverty. It ignores the structural discrepancies that are founded in rank bigotry. Black people are not merely less wealthy than White people. They have structural barriers specifically based upon their race that adds to the class disparity. As Chris Rock has pointed out in his routines, “There's not a White person in this room who'd trade places with me. None of you, none of you would trade places with me AND IM RICH!”
And look at your treatment of gay people: It’s true that you were one of only two non-Democrats who voted against DOMA (the other being Steve Gunderson…the gay Republican), but the reason you did so wasn’t because you thought gay people were deserving of equal treatment under the law. It was that you thought it should be left to the States.
And you’re surprised that core constituencies of the Democratic Party are not exactly enamored with you? For all your talk about “the progressive agenda,” you don’t seem to be able to speak to anything other than money. You talk about “the needs of working-class people” and ignore anything that isn’t wages and billionaires.
So yes, let’s be glad that Mamdani won the primary. Let’s look at how he ran his campaign. Let’s see if we can adapt those techniques to other races in other communities. One of the big differences between Mamdani and Cuomo was the emphasis on the local issues. But how does that apply to a national campaign? Even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez understands that she couldn’t get elected in other districts.
And that doesn’t even get into your dismal failure to actually pass legislation.
If you truly care about stopping the Republican/MAGA/Project 2025/fascist agenda, how does this help? You are speaking from a position of incredible weakness so the next time you decide to offer a critique, I would suggest you pay attention to a motto a good friend of mine has:
What good can come of it?
How does kicking Harris help?
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