Prominent Liberal Demands Do-Over

Bernie Sanders is furious and he demands the Election Board in New York go back to the drawing board and try again. New York state actually dared to cancel their Democrat presidential primary. The COVID-19 pandemic doesn’t matter to Bernie. Also, the fact that Joe Biden is the only one left standing in the Democrat race is only a technicality to the card carrying member of the Socialist Party. He’s still relevant, he insists. He didn’t actually drop out, that would make him a loser. He merely “suspended” his campaign. Bernie believes his followers should still be allowed to support him even if he’s not actually running.

Bernie demands a decision reversal

According to Douglas Kellner, one of two Democrat commissioners on the New York State Board of Elections, it would be “unnecessary and frivolous” to hold a primary “in a state that is the epicenter of the U.S. coronavirus outbreak.” Especially, since Joe Biden is the Democratic Party’s assumed choice. The date had already been moved from April to late June but with all the chaos and confusion, it’s become more of an unnecessary expense than a contest.

Sanders put his campaign on hold without actually dropping out, on April 8. Now, he demands that his name remain on the ballot all the way up to November. That way, he claims, his progressive supporters can “choose like-minded delegates to influence the party’s platform.” The wheels may have come off his revolution but Sanders is still trying to move things further left.

The Sanders political organization issued a statement deploring the decision of the Election Commissioners, calling it “an outrage, a blow to American democracy.” Senior adviser Jeff Weaver wants the Democratic National Committee to reverse the ruling. “While we understood that we did not have the votes to win the Democratic nomination, our campaign was suspended, not ended, because people in every state should have the right to express their preference.”

The lawyers are already on it

There really are a growing number of Bernie backers who still want to vote for the Vermont Senator as “a symbolic show of support.” Just one day before the primary was shelved, attorneys for the campaign “submitted a letter opposing his planned omission from the ballot.” They intend to “maximize” the influence of “the eventual policy platforms.”

The strategy is part of what the Sanders campaign calls “a larger effort to shore up convention delegates nationally.” They way, Bernie can use his influence to get his friends “on the rules and bylaws, party platform, and convention credentials committees at the Democratic National Convention.”

All he needs are one-fourth of the delegates to “enable the Sanders bloc to submit a minority report to the convention floor.” That would give the hard-left progressives “influence on key party issues.”

Liberals are having a conniption. “Their decision is bad,” declares Ohio state Senator Nina Turner. “The ability of the people to weigh in was stripped from them before they had an opportunity to cast a ballot.” Human Rights Watch agrees. They penned an op-ed complaining that “even as the country wrestles the life and death decisions associated with a pandemic, protecting the right to vote is more important now than ever.”