The Broken Sanders Narrative

Bernie Sanders has been out of the democratic nomination for a couple weeks. Everyone has been so busy with Covid-19 that the 2020 election has practically dropped off the radar. However, Joe Biden is now the presumed democratic nominee. Between having the most delegates and the most votes, Sanders couldn’t find a pathway to clear victory and decided to drop out and endorse Joe Biden. He led a raft of progressives gathering around the Biden flag. While everyone else waits for his VP pick, which is any combination of Gretchen Witmer of Michigan, Kamala Harris of California, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota or Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, disillusioned Sanders supporters have taken to the internet to express their problem with the whole damn party and system. A few of the more extreme cases on Twitter have decided that they need to destroy the entire democratic party in order to push forth their candidates and get a progressive agenda through. 

The bulk of this idea stems from the idea that the DNC is cheating Sanders out of the nomination and that they’ve done it twice in a row. When one of my Twitter followers asked me why voting machines were removed in some primaries and that clearly the DNC was responsible for it I replied that they were wrong. Primary elections are run through local election officials and the DNC has little power beyond suing those jurisdictions, to control how their caucuses and primaries are conducted. There are state laws to navigate as well. I did not get a reply from the follower when I revealed this to them. 

As you can imagine, Bernie Sanders supporters are feeling many things right now. Many feel betrayal and cheated while still others feel that the DNC must pay for its treachery. I imagine that part of that is simply the feeling of loss. It is hard when your candidate drops out of the race. But Sanders also tied into leftist populism. Losing Sanders is like what the Right might go through if President Trump loses. For many on the Left, Sanders was not just a presidential candidate, he expressed a savior like quality that many voters embraced. 

This narrative doesn’t work. In South Carolina, Sanders was only able to increase his share of the vote with black voters by 2%. This man has been running for president for the last 4 years and somehow voters still weren’t interested. And that’s the problem with this rigged narrative and blaming all Sanders’ electoral losses on the DNC. It’s just not true. There is a strong third of the party that agrees with Bernie Sanders. Unfortunately, one third does not a nomination earn. 

A variety of Bernie Sanders supporters are unhappy right now. They feel like they’ve been screwed over and to deal with those feelings they blame the DNC and the new Sanders narrative is that the DNC is corrupt and must be stopped and taken down. And people wonder why I say that Sanders is the flip-side of Trump. This narrative sounds like something cooked up by Bannon or Kushner.

This narrative is dangerous going into arguably the most important presidential election in US History. Ultimately, voters must choose between 4 more years of deadly incompetence or something else that might look like real leadership. This narrative doesn’t work because its not true. Voters decided to pick Joe Biden. It really is that simple. The other reason this narrative doesn’t work is because it turns off long-time democrats and those who felt Sanders just wasn’t the right guy for the job. Sanders supports act as if Sanders was the only person that can save the country. That narrative sounds awfully similar to, “I alone can fix it.” From Donald Trump.

And here’s where this narrative gets dangerous. If the entire progressive movement is predicated on a single-person than it will never work. Progressives in the early 20th century didn’t really know that their greatest advocate would come in the form of FDR. They had to endure the better part of 10 years of Republican presidents to get someone to take on real labor reform, farm reform, and much more. The progressive movement of the early 20th century was not centered on a person; it was centered on a specific set of central ideas about how American society should be run. Progressives of today would do well to begin their revolution from within the party and continue to push for progressive policies with each election. They need to educate the public on these issues and they need to garner the critical mass that gets things done in politics. Change does not happen over night, it comes with each new law and with each new opportunity to create something new for a marginalized group or reform a system. Over time this leads to moments where real change can happen. Civil Rights was not won just in 1964 with the signing of the Voting Rights bill. It took 15 years of advocacy to get that law passed. A similar story played out for gay marriage and mainstream homosexuality. This is how change happens.

Sanders supporters need to leave behind their broken and conspiratorial message and consign their messianic ideas to the dustbin and embrace the long haul of changing America.