Editor’s note: Reporter Kit Norton has been traveling with the Sanders 2020 presidential campaign.
LAS VEGAS — “Today was a day,” the senior aide said — with a crude modifier thrown in for good measure.
That’s how Ari Rabin Havt, longtime senior adviser to Bernie Sanders, greeted national reporters in Las Vegas, last Friday evening — 24 hours before the Nevada caucuses.
It was quite a whirlwind. The Vermont senator spent Friday dashing across the state next door — holding three events in California — before traveling to Las Vegas for one final campaign event in Nevada.
Just hours before speaking in Las Vegas, Sanders and his entourage were still on the road.
In the morning, he was in Santa Ana, California, for two morning events before heading 150 miles northwest for an afternoon rally in Bakersfield. Then, he flew out of Los Angeles — covering another 300 miles in a little more than an hour — to get to a 7:30 p.m. speech in Vegas.
The Washington Post had also just reported that, citing unnamed national security sources, Russia was attempting to influence the 2020 election, attempting to sow discord in the Democratic primary and boost Sanders’ standing.
“I was supposed to have a day off,” Havt said. “I need a haircut.”
Sanders’ staffers were not the only ones feeling the strain of the rigorous campaign schedule.
When Nina Turner, a top surrogate for Sanders, took the stage at the Springs Preserve Amphitheater, a natural history museum 3 miles west of downtown, that Friday night, her voice was almost gone after holding a number of events that day energizing volunteers for the final push before the caucuses.
People had been lining up outside the venue since 4:30 p.m. alongside countless vendors selling baseball caps, pins and shirts — all Sanders-themed.
A T-shirt with the now famous photo of a young Sanders being hauled away by two police officers was the best selling item for one vendor.
“People will buy four to five of this same shirt at these rallies,” he said. “We sell out of sizes on this one real quick.”
Some of the local Las Vegas media were even eying the merchandise. Ben Fama, who runs a production company called FAMA Media, asked a vendor how much the Sanders T-shirts cost before saying that, ethically, he could not buy them but his partner, who was waiting in line to see the Vermont independent, would purchase them instead.
“I’ll tell my wife to buy them.”
Some people in the line were discussing billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s recent attack on Sanders that he was a socialist who owns three homes.
“He has to have two houses. It has to happen, sorry,” said one ardent Sanders supporter about the need for a U.S. senator to have a place to live in Washington, D.C., and a home in the state he represents.
On the discussion of Sanders’ third house — which he describes as a summer camp in North Hero — the woman said: “We even have a camp.”
Bobby Thomas, a middle aged Las Vegas resident who had come to the rally with his wife, said he still wasn’t sure who he was going to vote for the next day, but was leaning toward Sanders.
Thomas said in addition to the Vermont independent he was considering former Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Bloomberg.
“Bernie seems like he is the front-runner in my mind,” Thomas said. “He always seems to be honest, straightforward, no nonsense and whenever he talks, he talks about the issues that we are dealing with now.”
Unlike Thomas, James Zike had made up his mind and had already voted for Sanders during Nevada’s early caucus process.
However, that vote was disqualified after Zike forgot to sign a form; he would be heading to his caucus precinct location again on Saturday. He’d even put his vacation plans to Miami on hold in order to make sure his vote counted.
“He’s the only one who really cares about the people,” Zike said, echoing a common refrain among Sanders’ Nevada supporters.
“His politics have always been the same, he’s always voted against the war and always for the people for years,” he added. “He doesn’t use talking points that a lot of politicians use and flip-flop a lot.”
Zike, who supported Sanders in 2016, said he had briefly considered voting for the other progressive in the race, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., this time around but was turned off after he thought she shifted to the center on health care reform.
“All of a sudden she went moderate with health care and wishy-washy there. I went ‘OK, she’s playing the political game,’” Zike said. “I dropped her right away when she did that.”
Not everyone at the amphitheater rally was enamored with Sanders, however, including Frank Forsey, who had traveled from California for the weekend to see President Donald Trump in his Las Vegas reelection rally.
After the Trump event, where he waited in line for three hours, Forsey had decided to see the Vermont senator in the flesh.
“I want to hear what he stands for,” Forsey said. “I have a pretty good idea what he stands for. It doesn’t make a bit of sense to me. I expect him to say he’s going to give everything to everybody and he’s going to have a way of solving all the problems by taxing the rich.”
Forsey said he wouldn’t vote for any of the Democrats — the last one he would have supported was President Harry Truman.
In a preview of a possible showdown with Trump, Forsey also insinuated Sanders was an anti-American communist.
“What I would like to ask him is why in the world did he go to Russia for his honeymoon — that was in the height of the Cold War,” he said.
“I’m not even sure about this character. I’m not sure if he’s a decent American,” Forsey added.
When Sanders finally came on stage, to chants of “Bernie, Bernie” from the crowd of more than 2,000, he looked fresh and well-rested — defying the day’s hectic manner.
It was 69 degrees that night, unseasonably warm, even for the Nevada desert. The Vermont senator wore his campaign trail staple outfit: navy blazer, sweater, a dress shirt unbuttoned at the neck, no tie, of course.
Next to his podium was his stainless steel reusable water bottle, bedecked with a red sticker emblazoned with his name, but, unlike other campaign events, a plastic bottle of Smartwater went next to it.
On that eve of the Nevada caucuses — well before the results would show a decisive victory — under the lights that were illuminating the stage and projecting his name on the rock ledge surrounding him, the Vermont senator celebrated early.
“Change is our mantra. We are going to change this country,” Sanders said. “We are going to defeat Donald Trump because the American people understand, no matter what their political views may be, that we cannot continue having a pathological liar as president.”
“We’re taking on Donald Trump and the Republican establishment, and we’re taking on the Democratic establishment,” he added, receiving the biggest cheer of the night for including a shot at the party elites.
“When we stand up together, they ain’t going to stop us.”
A Knockout Punch
The next day, Saturday, while Tyson Fury beat Deontay Wilder by TKO in a much anticipated heavyweight boxing match at the Grand Garden Arena in downtown Las Vegas, Sanders delivered his own knockout punch to his Democratic rivals. When the final tally was in he had almost 47% of the vote — more than double the second place finisher.
Before caucus locations opened, it began to rain, the water mixing with motor oil, creating slick roads and dangerous driving conditions.
Later in the day, Donna West, the chair of the Clark County Democrats, said on a radio program that people don’t usually come out in rainy weather but they did that Saturday to caucus.
By the time the rain came down in Las Vegas, Sanders was already in Texas, continuing his tour of key Super Tuesday contests, holding rallies in El Paso and San Antonio.
At an East Las Vegas community center, in the predominantly working class Latino area of the city, volunteers for Sanders braved the downpour to help people enter the building to attend the caucus. This was the last step in the Vermont senator’s East Las Vegas campaign strategy which had been a priority since he first opened up an operation in the state in the summer of 2019.
“He’s a grandpa,” Elene Garcia, a 21-year-old student and first-time caucus goer, said with a laugh explaining why she was supporting Sanders.
“He’s for the people,” she added while she waited to vote. “I’m Hispanic and not all of us can vote, so I’m here for them.”
Escaping the rain outside, Hamadi Mhadeni, said his first vote had been for Barack Obama in 2012 and that he was now supporting Sanders. No other candidate interested him much, he said.
“I like (him) because he’s generous. He’s for Medicare for All,” he said.
In the end, Sanders won the precinct, the largest in East Las Vegas, receiving 13 of the 27 county delegates. Warren was awarded eight county delegate equivalents and former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg was given six.
According to entrance polling, Latino voters overwhelmingly preferred Sanders to any other candidate, but this minority demographic was not the only one that Sanders performed well with in Nevada.
North of Reno on the Pyramid Lake Pauite Indian Reservation, Native voters came out for Sanders and he collected all but one county delegate from those caucus precincts.
At 4:50 p.m. local time, the Associated Press called the race for the Vermont senator.
Days later, with all precincts reporting, Sanders had 46.8% of the vote and 24 of the 36 delegates up for grabs. Biden was second with 20.2% and nine delegates, Buttigieg was third with 14.3% accompanied by three delegates and Warren came in fourth with 9.7%.
In Clark County, where the majority of Nevada’s population lives — including Las Vegas — the Vermont senator took 49%. In 2016, up against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Sanders lost Clark County by more than 9 points — Clinton received 54.8% and Sanders had 45.1%.
When the AP gave Sanders the victory, the Vermont senator’s campaign staff, volunteers and supporters were already taking up two rooms and an outdoor lounge in ReBar, a funky hole-in-the-wall establishment north of the strip.
Cheers of “Bernie” and “Not me. Us” — the campaign slogan — began as news spread that Sanders had won.
“We out-organized a union that went on strike for six years. In two weeks, we out-organized them,” one organizer said as he drank a light beer.
This was in reference to the Culinary Union 226, which represents 60,000 members in the hospitality industry in Nevada. Just weeks before the caucus, the union had decided against endorsing a candidate, and publicly criticized Sanders’ Medicare for All proposal.
In the 1990s the union went on strike for six years, maintaining a 24/7 picket line with more than 550 workers throughout the process.
“I may go to Texas next,” the organizer continued. “Go home, start a GoFundMe, get some money and then go down to Texas.”
“If he wins South Carolina, it’s done,” another volunteer said, bumming a cigarette from another attendee.
Sanders claimed victory during a speech in San Antonio. Afterward, he phoned into the party to thank his staff personally.
“We will defeat Trump because the energy and the excitement and the grassroots activism of our movement in Nevada and all over this country,” he said.
Sanders went on, telling his staff that health insurance companies, Wall Street banks, drug companies and corporate media are becoming increasingly concerned that he may win the nomination.
“When people fight for justice by the millions, all the money in the world cannot stop us. I think we are on a road to victory and I think what happened tonight in Nevada is extraordinary,” he said.
“It’s on to South Carolina, California, it’s on together. Let’s defeat Trump and transform this country.”
