Sanders May Have Learned Wrong Lessons From 2016 [View all]

However long Sanders remains in the race, Biden’s resurgence laid bare that, at his core, the senator is in some ways more of a cause than a candidate. And movement politics rarely lead to winning national elections.

Sanders’ team also appears to have underappreciated the shift in the nation’s suburbs away from Trump and toward centrist Democrats who were vital in sweeping the party back into control of the House in 2018.

Sanders’ embrace of democratic socialism is particularly scary to such educated moderates, who, above all, are looking for the most “electable” candidate to take on Trump this fall.

“Bernie is Captain 35%. That’s the magic number of the ultra-liberal, ultra-progressives that are standing with him bar none,” Democratic pollster Jeff Pollock said. “He failed to grow.”

As disappointing as that may be for Sanders, it’s also a warning sign for Trump, who has repeatedly tailored his appeal to his most fervent supporters. Both men found success in 2016 in part because they could benefit from the public’s harsh judgment of Hillary Clinton, who contended with both unwarranted sexism and self-inflicted wounds built up over more than three decades in the public eye.

Without Clinton as a foil in 2020, the appeal of Sanders didn’t seem to expand beyond his most loyal supporters. Trump could face the same challenge in the fall.




https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/03/12/sanders_may_have_learned_wrong_lessons_from_2016_142643.html