Violence and sexist attacks haven’t only come from the Donald Trump campaign during the 2016 election. Bernie Sanders supporters have allegedly sent threats to the chairwoman of the Nevada Democratic Party after 60 of their delegates were invalidated during the state party’s convention.
According to the Huffington Post, Nevada Democratic Party Chairwoman Roberta Lange has received a torrent of “threatening and sexist voicemails and text messages” since Saturday, when the convention at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel ended abruptly when Sanders supporters got upset over news that 60 of his delegates were now ineligible to participate in the national Democratic Convention. Supposedly because they hadn’t registered in time.
The Huffington Post has printed some of these texts, which include such messages as “corrupt b*tch,” and the ominous “we know where you live, where you work, where you eat, where your kids go to school/grandkids.” Lange has been most shaken up by a voicemail that told her to commit suicide.
The New York Times has more information on what the Sanders supporters are upset about. Since Hillary Clinton won the Nevada Caucus, Sanders supporters have tried to recruit delegates at county conventions to beef up his overall count. That all went to hell when the party deemed 60 of them ineligible, and then when security shut down the convention, saying they couldn’t ensure safety because the supporters were allegedly “yelling and throwing things.”
As for what the Sanders campaign thinks, they issued a statement that focuses on the disenfranchisement of their supporters. The statement asserted that the party leadership ruled unilaterally on which delegates counted without hearing from the rest of the attendees, through motions, amendments, or any other procedures. As a result:
The Democratic Party has a choice. It can open its doors and welcome into the party people who are prepared to fight for real economic and social change — people who are willing to take on Wall Street, corporate greed and a fossil fuel industry which is destroying this planet. Or the party can choose to maintain its status quo, remain dependent on big-money campaign contributions and be a party with limited participation and limited energy.
The statement also denies that Sanders supporters have a “penchant for violence,” as the Sanders campaign characterizes Nevada party leaders as saying.
One can definitely see both sides to this story. On the one hand, you have a group of engaged voters who are participating in politics, but are disillusioned with how their voices may or may not be taken into account, and then you have people trying to do their jobs without having to be subjected to violent or sexist threats. It’s clear that there’s a major disconnect between Bernie Sanders, his supporters, and the rest of the Democratic Party.
You can read more of Sanders’ statement below:
https://twitter.com/aseitzwald/status/732645755014553601
(via Huffington Post and New York Times)