Summary
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. accused Bernie Sanders of taking millions from Big Pharma during a heated exchange, but Sanders refuted the claim, stating his donations came from workers, not corporate PACs.
Kennedy repeatedly insisted Sanders was the top recipient of pharmaceutical money in 2020, but financial data shows no corporate PAC contributions to Sanders.
Meanwhile, Kennedy has profited from anti-vaccine activism, earning millions from lawsuits and speaking fees.
The debate ended without Kennedy answering whether he would guarantee health care for all as HHS secretary.
“Cheat” is a wide-ranging term which is a little too cumbersome to use here, but there were absolutely some shenanigans at play.
The heavily abridged version (which is open to criticism for doing so) is that the democratic leadership had effectively selected Hilary Clinton before the party had even had the chance to select the candidate officially, and Bernie’s campaign had it’s legs done before it even had a chance to take off.
Would Bernie have won? Who knows, but he’s consistently a decent and open candidate.
They consistently presented these super delegates as a forgone conclusion.
Brilliant, thank you for the clarification. Eight years feels like a long time ago.
It’s still infuriating.
It’s completely inappropriate here. If I tell you the rules to the game. And you agree to play. As Sanders did. And we both abide by the rules. Then no one cheated.
Shenanigans? Barely. Wasserman Schultz lost her job over it. Minimally impacting the Sanders campaign for a few days at most.
The Democratic primary rules were ironically not very democratic. But no one violated them or cheated anyone. Sanders knew that that going in. And he still almost won. Not only that. He didn’t whine like a entitled child that he’d somehow been cheated. In a winner take all contest. He lost. But still won concessions. That’s why I voted for the man. He made the future primaries more democratic and open to people like himself.