Bernie Sanders Might Run For President Again & Twitter Doesn't Know How To Feel
I know you've already seen the headlines: a ton of people have teased at a presidential run in 2020, from Kanye West to Mark Cuban. I've gotta be honest: the thought of some of these folks running for office has been quite a bit disturbing (and even surprising) for me. But the most shocking announcement of all might be the one that came on Tuesday, May 29, when the former campaign manager of Bernie Sanders announced that the Independent senator from Vermont is considering hopping back in the race for the White House in the next election. You may be jumping for joy over this news, but the tweets about Bernie Sanders running for president in 2020 show that everyone else feels completely torn about this.
In an interview with C-Span's Washington Journal host John McArdle on May 29, Jason Weavers (Sanders’ senior adviser and 2016 campaign manager), reportedly said Sanders is "considering another run for the presidency. When the time comes I think we’ll have an answer to that. But right now he’s still considering it."
Although Weavers left the possibility of a presidential run in the air, some people obviously feel Sanders is the best person to beat Trump in 2020, and took to Twitter to express their excitement for his potential bid.
But, per usual, there were others who were less than thrilled about Weavers' announcement.
There are multiple reasons why people are torn about the potential bid: one being the fact that Sanders had been accused of splitting the Democratic Party's votes, which cost him the election. On the other hand, some people have also said that Sanders would have had a better chance of beating Trump in the 2016 race. So I'm really not surprised that the internet is torn, is what I'm saying.
Anyway, Weavers' announcement comes just over a week after Sanders announced that he would be running for reelection in the Senate in 2018. In a string of tweets after the news broke, Sanders wrote that his focus would be to fight against the president and Republicans.
"These are frightening and unprecedented times," Sanders said in one tweet on May 21. "We have a president who is not only a pathological liar, but someone who is trying to win votes by dividing our nation up based on the color of our skin, our country of origin, our religion, our gender or our sexual orientation."
He continued, “If reelected, you can be sure that I will continue to be the fiercest opponent in the Senate to the rightwing extremism of Trump and the Republican leadership."
Although Sanders' main focus appears to be his reelection campaign, that doesn't stop him from speaking out against President Donald Trump. Even in November 2016, just days after Trump won the presidential race, Sanders urged civilians to "mobilize" and "fight back" against Trump and his policies in an interview with BBC Radio 4, saying, "Our job is to oppose him vigorously through millions of people in many, many different ways."
He added,
We have got to rally millions of people to stand together, to say, 'We are not going to be deporting millions of Latinos from this country … We are not going to allow women to be insulted and attacked and have their rights taken away from them.
The same month, Sanders also gave a speech in front of the White House in relation to the ongoing fight against the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline, in which he said he was going to be Trump's "worst nightmare." So even if he doesn't run for office in 2020, we can at least guarantee that he'll never stop rallying against his former opponent.
Either way, it's looking like the 2020 race for the presidency will surely be an interesting one. There's a long way to go until the campaigns start, so we'll just have to see what happens. I, for one, can't wait.
