Bernie Sanders is rising quickly in the polls as Iowa and New Hampshire voters prepare to cast their ballots in the 2020 Democratic race for the White House.
This is making plenty of Democrats nervous.
“Bernie Sanders could be the nominee of our party,” 2020 Dem Pete Buttigieg messaged through his campaign in a recent email. “Bernie’s campaign is out-raising and out-spending us. If this continues, there’s a good chance he wins the Iowa caucuses.”
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Bernie On the Rise
As his poll numbers spike, Sanders is relishing in needling the Democratic establishment.
“They’re looking at recent polls in New Hampshire and in Iowa, and they’re saying, ‘Oh my God, Sanders can win!’” Sanders told a full auditorium in Ames, Iowa.
Bernie Sanders could easily win the nomination—unless somebody stops him. So why aren’t his opponents trying? https://t.co/61X8ZNthUM
— POLITICO (@politico) January 28, 2020
“Suddenly, we have the Democratic establishment very nervous about this campaign. We got Wall Street nervous,” Sanders told a large Sioux City crowd Sunday night. “They’re starting to think, could this really happen?”
Iowa and New Hampshire will be the first two states to cast ballots in the race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, and Sanders is doing exceptionally well in both. Iowa’s caucuses are Monday, while the New Hampshire primary is a week from today.
The latest Iowa poll from Emerson gives Sanders 30 percent, former Vice President Joe Biden at 21 percent and Elizabeth Warren, 11 percent. In the latest New York Times/Siena poll, Sanders is leading in Iowa at 25 percent to “Mayor” Pete Buttigieg’s 18 percent, followed by Biden’s 17 percent.
A New Hampshire poll released Thursday by WBUR-TV gave Sanders a whopping 12-point lead over his fellow Dems, with Buttigieg in second and Biden in third. Biden has been dropping in recent polls, but not as much as Warren.
six-way parlay: bernie wins iowa, bernie wins new hampshire, bernie wins nevada, bernie wins california, bernie wins nomination, bernie beats trump. read it back to me. https://t.co/vlcu25cdlD
— Alex Jacquez (@AlexSJacquez) January 23, 2020
Moderate Democrats Worried
As Sanders continues to rise in these important early states, some of his far-left socialist proposals have some moderate Democrats worried.
“We issued a warning a year ago that Sanders could win the nomination and would likely lose to Trump. And we’ve been the only ones really taking the fight to him,” Matt Bennett, the vice president of the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way, told NBC News. “It’s past time for other Democrats to come off the sidelines and for the media to start doing its job to vet a serious contender for the nomination,” he added.
“We simply can’t stand by while there’s a threat that Democrats could nominate a guy who would hand such nuclear-level ammunition to the Trump campaign,” Bennett finished.