Bernie Sanders’ campaign has apologized to the “Black Lives Matter” agitators but the candidate himself makes it clear he hasn’t.
Over the weekend, Sanders’ campaign issued a statement “officially” apologizing to the protesters who disrupted his Seattle event last week.
“We wanted to let you know that we hear you, we want to do a better job speaking out on the issues, and as a sitting U.S. Senator, possibly introducing legislation and making a constitutional change,” campaign African-American outreach director Marcus Ferrell wrote in an email, BuzzFeed reports.
What “constitutional change” the campaign is considering wasn’t clear.
“As you may or may not know, our campaign and your movement has run across each other on 2 different occasions. We would like to have a more formal interaction with the movement,” Ferrell said. “We are hoping to establish a REAL space for REAL dialog between the folks on this email and our campaign.”
This came after two women stormed the Seattle rally stage and seized the microphone from Sanders, pushing him out of the way.
One of them, who identified herself as Marissa Johnson, implied the crowd was racist when they booed her demands to speak before Sanders.
“I was going to tell Bernie how racist this city is — with all of its progressives — but you’ve already done that for me. Thank you,” she said, The Hill reports.
KOMO reports one of the activists called the crowd “white supremacist liberals” before Sanders fled.
Sunday, when the candidate appeared on “Meet the Press,” he was asked about his apology.
“Well, that was sent out by a staffer, not by me. Look, we are reaching out to all kinds of groups, absolutely,” Sanders said, seemingly to imply that “all” lives matter.
“I understand that but,” host Chuck Todd replied, “you said a staffer put it out, but you felt an apology was necessary?”
“No, I don’t,” Sanders said, according to Real Clear Politics. “I think we’re going to be working with all groups. This was sent out without my knowledge.”
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