The immediate stakes of the election are in little doubt.
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Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders criticized both Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump while speaking in San Diego, Calif., June 5. This contrasts with sentiment among Democrats overall, as 71 percent would like to see Sanders throw his support to Clinton and have a unified convention once these primaries are done.
The sprawling and rebellious scene in Southern California captured the spirit of the Sanders campaign ahead of the primaries that will take place Tuesday here and in five other states. Last week’s report by the inspector general of the State Department made clear that in relying exclusively on a private email server as secretary of state, she violated department policy, put security in danger, and lied about what she had done.
Even as his national hopes have faded, Sanders has surged in California, battling Clinton to a virtual tie. This is the greatest ride of his political career, and he has no intention of exiting until it has come to a full and complete stop. California, the country’s most populous state, has 548 delegates who will be awarded proportionately to the popular vote.
So why isn’t there a swell of support for one of America’s most respected women?
He remained defiant about the Democratic nomination at an event Saturday, claiming, “the Democratic National Convention will be a contested convention”, because Clinton would be reliant on superdelegates to cross the finish line – who could change their minds, however unlikely that is.
She called Sanders “a moment in the movement” for more liberal causes.
The durability of tension now flaring in the primary is unclear.
“Assuming the California primary goes the way I expect it will, with Hillary winning a spirited, contested and relatively close race”, Davis said, “there will be a period where some of the Sanders supporters go through a period of mourning”. The Vermont senator reminded voters about the state’s California primary, urging them to vote. Unlike earlier states, Sanders has managed to make significant inroads with California’s minorities, commanding the support of younger Latino and Asian voters, according to the USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times Poll.
Many grass-roots workers in technology, entertainment or media may prefer Bernie, but the big money and the big bosses are, nearly without exception, for the former secretary of state.
“Those voters are less likely to be voting by mail and more likely to vote more on the basis of name recognition”, Godwin said.
“I was really proud of her for doing that”, she added. Three out of every four new voters was a Democrat.
There certainly is no path to the general election any other way. “It means the world to me”, she said to a cheering throng at the college gymnasium. “The case we have to make to the superdelegates is that Donald Trump will be a disaster if he is elected president”.
But in the waning days of the contest, the divisions appeared to persist. Sanders campaigned there a week ago; Clinton was in the area on Friday and may return again before Tuesday’s vote.
Even Clinton’s most ardent backers say that the speech revealed a new candidate: one who is authentic and unafraid to push boundaries. “Because look, people are going to vote for whoever they decide to vote for”. “This is a generation or cohort of voters that we’re going to see for the next few decades, and they’re going to have a different view about some things”.
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In a separate interview on “State of the Union”, Sanders said Clinton will have to work hard to win over his supporters. Reporter: Trump told “The NY times” he didn’t think that Ali’s San Bernardino statement was referring to him and an Ali family spokesman reportedly said that Ali was referring to jihadists and extremists, not to trump.
