Why Sanders Is Staying in the Race, and More

http://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/why-bernie-sanders-is-staying-in-the-race?mbid=nl_TNY%20Template%20-%20With%20Photo%20(37)%20remainder&CNDID=39383214&spMailingID=8884245&spUserID=MTEzODU1MDAxMDY5S0&spJobID=920533917&spReportId=OTIwNTMzOTE3S0
  
Why Bernie Sanders Is Staying in the Race

By John Cassidy

                

Bernie Sanders, at a campaign rally in Louisville.Credit PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN SOMMERS II / GETTY

With Donald Trump more or less wrapping up the Republican nomination on Tuesday night, the fact that Bernie Sanders also scored a big victory in Indiana was somewhat overlooked. The Vermont senator overcame a sizable deficit in the opinion polls to finish ahead of Hillary Clinton by almost seven percentage points in a heartland state that she carried in 2008. It was his biggest upset since he won in Michigan, in March.

In a series of interviews on Wednesday, Sanders confirmed that he will stay in the Democratic race until at least June 14th, when the final primary will be held, in Washington, D.C. Sanders also said that he would try to win over Democratic superdelegates who are currently committed to his opponent, a strategy that could extend the contest until the Party Convention, in Philadelphia, at the end of July. “I think we have got to make the case that the superdelegates, who in many cases were onboard [with] Hillary Clinton even before I got in the race, that they should take a hard look at which candidate is stronger against Donald Trump,” Sanders said to NPR’s Steve Inskeep. “And I think we can make that case.”

Sanders’s determination to press on is causing consternation in the Clinton camp, and in the Democratic Party establishment. Eager to avoid alienating Sanders’s large body of supporters, most Party figures have avoided publicly calling on him to quit, but some are citing Trump’s victory as a reason to unify behind Clinton. “If [Sanders] wants to stay in and discuss the platform, that’s obviously his right,” Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who served in Bill Clinton’s Administration, told the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent. “But at this point, we’re on the verge of a choice between someone eminently sensible and qualified, and someone who is a real wild card. It’s a little frightening having him out there trying to take down the sensible candidate.”