“Donald Trump will not be elected president because at the end of the day, the American people understand that bringing people together – black and white and Latino and Asian American and Native American, straight and gay, male and female – will always trump divisiveness and trying to divide us,” Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said during his rally in Madison yesterday afternoon.
Sanders spoke before a raucous standing room-only crowd at the Orpheum Theatre in downtown Madison ahead of the Wisconsin Primary next Tuesday, April 5. Trump was in his crosshairs as well as Gov. Scott Walker, Wall Street, and Hillary Clinton.
“Here’s where we are right now: We have an opportunity to make American history and to transform our country. We should do it,” Sanders told the crowd. “I believe that we need a political revolution; a revolution where millions of people who have previously given up on politics in America and have turned their backs. I believe that we need to involve young people, many of whom have never been involved before.”
“I believe that when millions of people stand up, that we can create a government that works for all of us; not just the top 1 percent,” he added.
Sanders mentioned that this campaign is on a bit of a roll winning 6 of the last 7 states. “The lowest percentage of votes we got in winning was 67 percent.”
The Vermont senator mentioned that in the only state he lost, Arizona, they had major problems with voting where people waited in lines for 4 or 5 hours.
“You have a governor here in Wisconsin [Scott Walker] who appears to be working overtime to suppress the vote and that is an absolute outrage,” Sanders said. “I’ve been involved in many elections – I’ve lost some and won many … but it’s never occurred to me to try and figure out how to deny people the right to vote because they might vote against me. That is not what this country is supposed to be about.
“I say to Governor Walker and all other Republican governors, if you don’t have the guts to participate in free, fair, and open elections …. Get out of politics and get another job,” Sanders added.
The Marquette University Law School poll was released yesterday and it showed Sanders leading former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton 49 percent to 45 percent in Wisconsin. Sanders spent time distinguishing himself from his rival, mentioning that unlike her, he hasn’t sought out campaign contributions from Wall Street. He told the crowd that the average contribution to his campaign is $27. “What it has shown is that we can run a winning national campaign without being dependent on big money interests,” Sanders said. “Secretary Clinton has chosen to move in a different direction. She has several Super-PACS. The largest one reported a while back that in the last filing period they received $25 million from special interests including $15 million from Wall Street.
“Secretary Clinton and every other politician who receives money from special interests always has the same response: ‘Not going to influence me. They’re just giving us millions of dollars for the heck of it,'” Sanders added. “The questions that we have to ask for any special interest that puts millions of dollars into a campaign are: Why are they doing that? What do they expect in return?”
Sanders told the crowd that he doesn’t believe Republican frontrunner Donald Trump has a chance at the presidency.
“In my heart of hearts, I don’t believe the American people will ever elect a president who virtually every single day is insulting one group of people or another. A candidate will not be elected president who insults Mexicans and Latinos, who insults Muslims, who insults women,” Sanders said. “I got to tell you something: The American people are just flabbergasted at the nature of this Republican campaign. Here you have incredibly important issues facing the American people, and what these guys are doing are attacking each other’s wives. It’s beyond belief. It is something that is not only beyond comprehension to the average American, but if you are a sane Republican, you are looking at this in disbelief.”
The Sanders campaign has announced stops in Sheboygan and Green Bay on Friday. Sanders will be back in Madison at the Kohl Center on April 3.
