Even though he won his Vermont senate seat as an independent, Sen. Bernie Sanders pledged to do the party’s bidding and seek the presidency as a Democrat and govern as a Democrat if elected on Tuesday.
The Washington Post reports:
The move comes in response to a new rule from the Democratic National Committee that requires all candidates for the party’s 2020 presidential nomination to sign such a pledge — a change that some Sanders allies considered a swipe at the senator.
Despite any concern that the pledge is a swipe, or that Sanders may be selling out his ‘independent streak’, it seems that Sanders is actually still running as an independent – but only as a senator, you know, in case that Democratic presidential thing doesn’t work out.
Although Sanders began his second bid for the Democratic presidential nomination with a large rally Saturday in Brooklyn, he also has filed for reelection to his Senate seat in 2024 — as an independent.
Even after a previous DNC chairperson, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, stepped down amid accusations she rigged the 2016 Democratic presidential nominating process in favor of Hillary Clinton, Sanders still pledged to be weighed and measured by the chair of the party.
The pledge Sanders signed Tuesday states that the chairman of the DNC has the authority to determine 'whether a presidential candidate . . . is a bona fide Democrat whose record of public service, accomplishments, public writings and/or public statements affirmatively demonstrate that the candidate is faithful to the interests, welfare and success of the Democratic Party of the United States.'