Sanders når ikke gjennom til minoritetsvelgere, eller?

Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) er i vinden, og klatrer oppover på meningsmålingene i Iowa og New Hampshire om dagen. Utfordringen for Sanders ligger imidlertid i å nå gjennom til minoritetsvelgere som utgjør en den største velgergruppen i Det demokratiske partiet. Vermont har en befolkning som er 95 prosent hvit, og Sanders har, tross sin bakgrunn som en av USAs mest liberale politikere, liten erfaring med denne velgergruppen.

Hillary Clinton har siden april gått hardt ut i saker som omhandler rase- og minoritetsproblematikk, og vil trolig fortsette med det frem mot 2016. Sanders planla opprinnelig et større valgkamparrangement i Charleston, South Carolina sist søndag for å introdusere seg selv for svarte velgere, men eventet ble lagt på is grunnet forrige ukes tragiske hendelser.

Hele 92 prosent av demokratiske velgere sier at de kan se seg selv stemme på Clinton i presidentvalget, mens 40 prosent sier det samme om Sanders. 8 prosent svarer at de ikke ser for seg å stemme på Clinton, mens 32 svarer dette når de blir spurt om Sanders kandidatur.

New York Times:

The challenge facing Mr. Sanders as a Ben & Jerry’s candidate seeking the nomination of President Obama’s party was on vivid display last month in Burlington, Vt., at his first campaign rally.

Nearly all the speakers who preceded him — including the two ice cream entrepreneurs — were white, as were nearly all the supporters, many of them in tie-dyed clothes, who thronged a park on the shores of Lake Champlain. His jeremiads about campaign-finance overhaul and climate change inspired cheers and ovations. But he made no mention of problems of deep concern to many African-Americans, like policing, gun control, racial inequities or the high numbers of black men in prison.

“The Bernie Sanders voter is still a Volvo-driving, financially comfortable liberal who is pretty much white,” said Paul Maslin, a pollster who worked for the 2004 presidential campaign of Vermont’s last Democratic contender, Howard Dean. “I don’t see how Bernie takes large numbers of black voters away from Hillary Clinton, and he needs to if he wants any shot at the nomination.”

Mrs. Clinton, mindful of the biracial coalition Mr. Obama built in South Carolina in 2008 when he handed her a stinging loss, has already visited its African-American population centers twice. Mr. Sanders has yet to reschedule his first trip.

“She’s talking about the issues we care about,” said Bakari Sellers, a former South Carolina state representative who is black and is supporting Mrs. Clinton. “Whether it’s voting rights or police reform, Hillary is attacking them head-on.”

As for Mr. Sanders, he said, “I’m not hearing Bernie Sanders’s name at the barbershops.”

Les mer.