Bernie Sanders pitches progressive track record to New Hampshire voters
https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/03...pshire-voters/
Presidential hopeful cites his then-‘radical’ 2016 platform
PUBLISHED: March 10, 2019 at 8:48 pm | UPDATED: March 10, 2019 at 9:35 pm
CONCORD, N.H. — Bernie Sanders — undaunted by President Trump’s plan to attack Democratic “socialism” — launched his New Hampshire campaign Sunday insisting that his “radical” ideas from the run-up to 2016 are right for 2020, embraced “across the board” by his party’s candidates now.
Among a field of like-minded Democrats vying for a chance to unseat Trump in the 2020 election, Sanders is trying to win potential voters on the idea that he was the first to advocate for those progressive ideals.
“Those ideas that we talked about four years ago that seemed so very radical at that time, well, today, virtually all of those ideas are supported by a majority of the American people and have overwhelming support from Democrats and independents,” Sanders told hundreds of rallygoers in the ballroom of a Concord hotel in his first return to the Granite State since announcing his second run. “They’re ideas that Democratic candidates all across the board are supporting.”
Sanders picked up where he left off during his last run for president, wagging his finger at wage inequalities, the nation’s top one percent of earners, advocating for free tuition and universal health care — and condemning the superdelegate system within the Democratic National Convention, which helped Hillary Clinton lock the nomination in 2016. The DNC voted last August to limit their powers and not allow their votes on the first ballot.
Sanders supporters hadn’t forgotten Sunday that their candidate didn’t receive delegations of certain states like West Virginia, despite winning every county, in the 2016 primary.
“I won’t donate at all to the Democratic party,” said Shaun Sutliff, 61, of Adams, Mass., who added that he’d only support the party if they completely ended the superdelegate system, which gives party officials, Democratic members of Congress and others a thumb on the scale in choosing the nominee. “I’ll donate directly to Bernie, absolutely, but not to the party.”
Sutliff said the 77-year-old senator from Vermont has been consistent in his support for progressive reform and can break out in a field that includes other progressive leaders such as U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren. New Hampshire is seen as a must-win for both Warren and Sanders.
“I have respect for Liz Warren, but Bernie’s been walking the walk and talking the talk longer than any of them,” said Sutliff. “He doesn’t filter what he says depending on the audience.”
Carolyn Kegel, 23, of Concord, added that she has backed Sanders because he’s been the most vocal on progressive issues.
“I think for me personally, he was the first candidate that really grabbed my attention and he was the first I heard speaking out on these things,” Kegel said. “Like he was saying, in 2016 his ideas were considered radical and nobody was really speaking about them. But he’s been quietly doing this work for a while and for me, that sort of longevity and history and record is really important.”
In recent polling, Sanders leads the field of Democratic candidates who have announced, trailing only former Vice President Joe Biden, who hasn’t yet declared.
Trump has begun his 2020 bid by condemning socialism and claiming that each Democratic candidate has moved closer and closer to its ideology. Cody Bowman, a 24-year-old undecided voter from Newmarket N.H. said a path to presidency for a candidate who identifies with socialism, such as Sanders, isn’t easy.
“I think it’s difficult, for sure,” he said. “I think it’s possible, but it’s not the most conventional message in the United States. People hear ‘socialism’ and they kind of wig out.”
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