The Bernie or Bust Trap is Morally Irreprehensible
Bernie Sanders made history competing as one of the most successful leftist candidates to run for the U.S presidency. The Democrats’ consolidation around former Vice President Joe Biden may have squandered Sanders’ campaign, but it certainly did not kill the legacy of his progressive movement. The Sanders’ campaign inspired millions of the young and working class, and significantly shifted national discourse to the left. As a result, many of his supporters felt disheartened when Sanders suspended his campaign and endorsed Biden in April. Feelings of devastation, anger, and frustration resurfaced as the Democrats again ceded to neoliberalism, the re-investment in structural inequalities masked as the false promise of change.
Or was that what really happened? Many Sanders supporters have identified as “Bernie or Busters,” a group of people who refuse to vote in the general election if Biden is the nominee. Progressive talk show hosts such as Kyle Kulinski and The Hill’s news anchor Krystal Ball have subscribed to this notion, influencing many of the online lefties to adopt a similar position. A recent poll (USA Today) indicated that a good portion of Sanders supporters are likely to consider voting for a third-party candidate.
As a Sanders supporter, I relate to the frustration and anger amongst his supporters. I’m disheartened we won’t soon see a president fight for Medicare for All, a Green New Deal policy, or separating money from politics. But I find myself now equally frustrated at the supporters who equate Biden to Trump and thus refuse to vote Trump out of office.
Far too many Sanders supporters have stated that Biden wouldn’t be much different from Trump. Afterall, Biden said it himself: “nothing will fundamentally change.” However this “lesser of two evils” framing is a false dichotomy for the upcoming general election. Technically speaking, we always vote on the lesser of two evils (harm reduction), and this would be true for many voters if it had been Sanders vs. Trump. Rhetorically, such comparison minimizes the very real differences between Biden and Trump.
Firstly, Biden aligns a lot closer to progressive Democratic values than many Sanders supporters would like to believe. For one, he believes in expanding healthcare to a public option, threatening the immoral profiting of private insurance companies. It’s a giant step in the direction towards Medicare for All, and has a much greater chance at being passed. He has also made several policy concessions, including waiving the tuition and cancelling the debt of lower-income students attending public colleges. Most importantly, Biden is not a science denier and believes in the existential threat of climate change. Under his administration, the U.S could reclaim its role as the international leader of fighting climate change. Yes, Joe Biden does not go as far as we would like in his policies. But overall, progressives will have much more power organizing and pressuring a Biden administration than they would under Trump (zero!).
That fact of the matter is, we cannot afford a second term of the Trump Administration. President Trump is an incomptent pseudo-facist who fires anyone for disagreeing with him. He lies to the American public, greenlights white nationalists and neo-nazis, and promotes anti-science and anti-education rhetoric. His executive orders, like eliminating DACA and banning transgender militia have damaged progress to immigration and social causes. He mismanaged a pandemic that has resulted in thousands of preventable deaths. Not to mention, the U.S has lost its leverage around the world as we become an international embarrassment. The list goes on about the failures and damage the Trump Administration has caused.
When given the opportunity, Trump will also appoint a conservative Supreme Court justice nominee. This will threaten women’s reproductive rights, and result in the rulings of cases that will impact us, our children, and their children’s lives. With abortion rights already contested in several states, a conversative Supreme Court will make it difficult for women to have access to clinics. And beyond that, progressive hopes of getting legislation passed would be squandered. Progressive policies (medicare for all, green new deal, etc.) which require the federal government’s role to expand, would be ruled unconstitutional by a conservative court.
While the argument that equates Trump and Biden is bad, the most “interesting” argument is the idea of accelerationism. Some voters believe that a second term of the Trump Administration would kill neoliberalism, triggering the collapse of the mainstream complicitness with the U.S’ neoliberalism. They believe that the next conservative contender would be worse than Trump, an open fascist who echoes Trump’s sentiments of addressing the working class' needs. This would force Democrats to run a progressive contender to counteract a facist agenda. To be honest, while interesting, this argument reads off as a bad soap opera. There is zero evidence that the U.S shifts in ideological extremes from each administration. Yes the election cycle often swings from Democrat to Republican, Republican to Democrat, but it never swings from hard-core conservative to an extremely progressive administration.
If anything, a second term of Trump would push the country farther to the right. It’ll force us to continue to run a more centrist, compromised Democrats to appease independents and moderates. But most importantly, accelerationism has been proven FALSE. Those who ran the Bernie or Bust trial in 2016 thought a term of Trump would cause Sanders to run again, win the nomination, and then win the general. But now we see that isn’t the case, that the Democratic base has largely rejected Sanders’ ideas in favor of moderate policies.
Finally, I’m not just concerned about what the Bernie or Bust movement could do to our nation, but also to the progressive movement. While Sanders got some blame for Hillary Clinton’s loss due to his delayed endorsement, nothing will compare to the blame Sanders supporters would get if we ride out Bernie or Bust. Democrats would spite Bernie supporters and our agenda, and we may never get the possibility of leveraging the media (like AOC) in our favor again. Any hope we would have of political influence would be severely diminished.
By recognizing our weaknesses, shifting our strategy, capitalizing on our strengths, and adopting a reform of the system from within,the progressive movement can garner real influence and change. In the meantime, we can organize another grassroots movement under a prospective Biden’s administration and run a more effective progressive campaign in 2024 or 2028. But Bernie or Bust just isn’t that.
After all, as Sanders himself said, “Let us go forward together. The struggle continues.”
by ANDREA REIER