Democrat establishment trying to destroy Bernie Sanders just like GOP establishment is trying to destroy Trump

Saturday, January 09, 2016 by: J. D. Heyes
Tags: Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump, political establishment

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(NaturalNews) Supporters of top GOP presidential contender Donald Trump have watched angrily as the mainstream political and media establishment have spared no effort to disrupt and destroy his candidacy from the outset. His anti-politically-correct speech, his direct manner and his steadfast refusal to back down or apologize for his brash style have left the political-media establishment apoplectic, to be sure, but also clueless as how to stop his freight train of a campaign.

Now that Democrat presidential contender Sen. Bernie Sanders, D-Vt. (formerly Independent), is gaining in support and out-polling (in some states) the mainstream-preferred Democrat presidential contender, Hillary Clinton, that party's political-media establishment has turned their sights on "The Bern," and appears set to stop at nothing to destroy and derail him.

As reported by Politico, there is emerging "chaos" when it comes to the Democrat presidential primaries, with the Clinton campaign accusing the Sanders campaign of stealing voter data and the latter accusing the former of sabotage:

A civil war erupted within the Democratic Party [in December] after news that Bernie Sanders' campaign took advantage of a technological glitch to access, search and save one of Hillary Clinton's most valuable campaign assets — her voter files.

Tension rapidly escalated throughout the day as the Democratic National Committee cut off Sanders' access to his own voter files, effectively crippling his field operation, and the senator retaliated by suing the party and accusing its leaders of plotting to hand the presidential nomination to the Democratic frontrunner.

Charges the DNC already favors Clinton

Within hours, however, after consultations between Sanders' campaign, the DNC and a federal judge, an agreement was reached to give the Sanders campaign back its access.

Still, the DNC tactic goes to show how far the Democrat establishment is willing to go in order to ensure a Clinton coronation.

"The Sanders campaign has now complied with the DNC's request to provide the information that we have requested of them," DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz said in a statement. "Based on this information, we are restoring the Sanders campaign's access to the voter file, but will continue to investigate to ensure that the data that was inappropriately accessed has been deleted and is no longer in possession of the Sanders campaign. The Sanders campaign has agreed to fully cooperate with the continuing DNC investigation of this breach."

Clinton campaign press secretary Brian Fallon added, "We are pleased that the Sanders campaign has agreed to submit to an independent audit to determine the full extent of the intrusion its staff carried out earlier this week, and also to ensure that Sanders' voter file no longer contains any of the proprietary data that was taken from us. We believe this audit should proceed immediately, and, pending its findings, we expect further disciplinary action to be taken as appropriate."

Still, the Sanders campaign accused the DNC and Clinton of attempted sabotage.

Too few debates

"The leadership of the Democratic National Committee is now actively attempting to undermine our campaign. This is unacceptable," Jeff Weaver, Sanders' campaign manager, said before the dispute was settled. "Individual leaders of the DNC can support Hillary Clinton in any way they want, but they are not going to sabotage our campaign — one of the strongest grassroots campaigns in modern history."

This isn't the first time that Sanders has complained that the DNC is tilting mightily toward Clinton. In fact, the other Democrat in the race, former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who is barely registering in the polls, has also accused the DNC of outsized support for Clinton.

For instance, both have voiced opposition to the DNC's scant debate schedule, citing the six debates as too few.

"The Democratic Party should not limit debates or close off debates," he said at a press conference in New York in mid-December. "Look when the Republicans scheduled theirs: On a weeknight when the greatest number of people see it and talk about it the next day. Look when our party schedules the debates: the same time as [the movie] Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer — on a Saturday."

Both men rebuffed the DNC leadership during a summer meeting in which debate schedules, and other matters, were discussed, Vice News reported.

Sources:

Politico.com

News.Vice.com

ABCNews.Go.com