President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign is taking aim at Bernie Sanders as the Vermont senator surges in polls ahead of opening salvos in the Democratic primary.
A barrage of social media posts in January from the president’s staff and surrogates target Sanders for his views on foreign affairs, Medicare for All, and policies to combat climate change.
On Jan. 16, Trump’s re-election campaign posted a video to its social media accounts depicting the exchange between Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren at the end of the last Democratic presidential primary debate.
The clip shows Warren dismiss Sanders’ offered handshake and accuse him of calling her a liar on national television for his denial that he said a woman could not win the White House in the 2020 election. The Vermont senator can be heard telling Warren “let’s not do it right now” as they both turn away from each other.
“Bernie Sanders couldn’t even stand up to Pocahontas,” Trump’s campaign wrote, invoking a racial slur to refer to Warren — a term the president has widely used to mock Warren’s claim of Native American ancestry.
“There’s no way he could ever stand up to China and Russia!” the campaign added.
Since Sanders announced his presidential bid in February 2019, he has consistently focused his attacks on Trump, even as he has had skirmishes with other candidates along the way.
The Vermont independent regularly calls Trump “the most dangerous president in American history” and includes the lines that he is a “pathological liar and a racist” during his stump speeches.
Now, in the run-up to the Iowa caucuses, Sanders is rising in national and statewide polls, elevating him firmly to the status of frontrunner in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Trump, for his part, is turning his attention to Sanders, as he begins to dial in on his possible general election opponent.
Throughout January, Trump’s 2020 reelection website has published content calling the Vermont senator a “wealthy, fossil fuel-guzzling millionaire” and someone who cannot “be trusted to defend American lives” — while mostly keeping mum on other candidates.
The Trump campaign has also gone after Sanders’ high-profile surrogate Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., for a recent trip to Iowa, calling it an example of a “socialist invasion” that is underway in the U.S. — spearheaded by Sanders.
While the Trump campaign said publicly in January that the president has not “put his target” on any individual candidate in the Democratic primary, the Trump team has clearly dialed in on the Vermont senator.
On Jan. 14, the New York Times reported that some of Trump’s top advisers perceive Sanders to be more beatable than others in the general election and are working to elevate his candidacy.
However, there seems to be a divide in Trump’s camp on whether to bolster Sanders or attack him, with the president himself unsure of what course of action to take, Politico reports.
The list of those who have leveled online attacks in the past two weeks against Sanders includeBrad Parscale, Trump’s campaign manager; Marc Lotter, Trump’s director of strategic communications; Matt Wolking, deputy director of communications; Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee; Francis Brennan, Trump’s director of strategic response; and an assortment of other members of the campaign.
In January, Trump’s team has also gone after Sanders for using private jets while pushing for climate action policies, failing to support veterans and condemning the assassination of Iranian general Qasem Soleimani.
While some criticisms went after policies, Trump-backed advertisements on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter targeted the Vermont senator for being a democratic socialist.
On Jan. 13, John Pence — Vice President Mike Pence’s nephew and senior adviser to Trump — tweeted out an ad comparing Sanders to Hugo Chavez, Venezuela’s former president.
“A ‘democratic socialist named Bernie Sanders is leading the polls in Iowa,” John Pence wrote. “Let’s renew our resolve that America will NEVER be a socialist country by RE-ELECTING President Trump this fall.”
America will NEVER be a socialist country. pic.twitter.com/wsvPw6ueoj
— Mike Pence (@Mike_Pence) January 13, 2020
Vice President Mike Pence also shared the ad, which ends on a frame of Sanders’ face as Trump tells Congress “we are born free and we will stay free.”
Since Jan. 28, Trump has also been running Facebook ads in Iowa calling former Vice President Joe Biden, “Sleepy Joe”; Warren, “Pocahontas”; and Sanders, “Crazy Bernie.” Trump is running around 30 of the ads, all in Iowa, and between May 2018 and Jan. 28, 2020, he has spent more than $29 million on Facebook ads.
“Our economy has never been better. Our military is stronger than ever. We are WINNING again. I need you to prove to the Democrats that we want to Keep America Great on Monday, February 3rd,” the ad reads.
A number of political action committees with ties to Trump have also been been running ads on the popular social media platform.
America First Policies, which was co-founded by Trump’s current campaign manager, has spent $1.3 million on ads on Facebook and Instagram, and is currently running a “Stop Socialism” ad in Pennsylvania — a battleground state Trump has been concerned Sanders might perform well in.
During the summer, the pro-Trump group, 45Committee, paid Facebook between $10,000 and $50,000 to run a 30-second ad that flashes Sanders’ face as it claims “death threats” and “violence” in the U.S. are the result of the “far left moving to socialism.”
The online salvo from the right comes at a time when Sanders has received criticism for how his own supporters behave on social media.
Some progressive activists who have decided not to support Sanders have been forced to begin traveling with private security after receiving online harassment, the New York Times has reported.
This has included well-known feminist writers who have received death threats, a state party chairperson who had to change her phone number and a Portland lawyer who was flooded with negative online reviews after arguing with Sanders supporters on Twitter, according to the Times.
The actions of Sanders’ online hordes forced the Vermont senator to put out a statement calling for civility. “I condemn bullying and harassment of any kind and in any space,” Sanders said in a 2019 letter to supporters.
