Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) claims former Vice President Joe Biden has an edge with African American voters because of his ties to former President Barack Obama.
On Wednesday, Sanders sat down with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow where he discussed the results of Super Tuesday. As previously reported on IJR, the big primary election day didn’t turn out as projected.
However, Sanders believes there is a reason for that. During the interview, Maddow raised questions about Sanders’ struggle to win over African American voters. Maddow noted that Sanders failed to even reach 20% of the African American vote in the Southern region of the United States.
Sanders responded by noting that he had received 39% support of Latinos, Asian Americans, and African Americans in California. Maddow doubled down on her stance reminding Sanders that he is still being “out paced” by Biden in California by Black voter support, as well.
Despite the numbers, Sanders still doesn’t believe he is unpopular. He highlighted the fact that Biden spent eight years in the White House alongside Obama who he described as “enormously popular.”
“It’s not that I’m not popular. Biden is running with his ties to Obama,” Sanders said adding, “And that’s working well.”
Maddow continued to press Sanders noting that he faced the same problem during his presidential run against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016. Like Biden, Clinton also dominated the South although in other regions across the country, the two actually ran a relatively close race.
However, Sanders also insisted Clinton’s enormous popularity and public status gave her the same edge. He described himself as a “virtually unknown” during the 2016 Democratic primary and he insists he is facing a similar battle against Biden.
“Now I’m running against Barack Obama’s vice president,” he said.
Check out Sanders’ interview:
Sanders’ latest interview follows a string of reports about Biden’s big wins on Super Tuesday.
In the wake of Biden’s recent endorsement surge, Republicans have raised concerns about the way the Democratic primary is being handled. President Donald Trump also accused Democrats of rigging the election in an effort to take Sanders out of the race. However, Sanders simply asked him to stay out of the situation.