When Bernie burst onto the scene (again) for the 2020 presidential race, fans in favor of socialism were stoked. Bern was gonna get in there and change things up. Who needs to be able to own their own business? Let the Nazis’ favorite economic system take hold!

But alas, it was not to be — yet. Bernie dropped out, and surely many a hopeful revolutionary felt just plain down in the dumps.

But Bernie’s moved on, to the degree that he actually endorsed Mr. Establishment, Joe Biden.

And now some of those Sanders supporters just can’t follow the leader anymore.

According to a USA Today/Suffolk poll, almost a quarter of Americans who were behind Bernie balk at backing Biden.

Here’s USA Today with some stunning news:

Nearly 1 in 4 Sanders supporters (22%) said they would vote for a third party candidate, vote for President Donald Trump, not vote in November or were undecided about who to vote for.

Did you expect that? That some of the Bernie fallout would land with Trump? Maybe they feel betrayed by the Democratic Party. Maybe they should’ve already felt that way, given the inner workings working against their man last go ’round — when Hillary yanked the nomination from Vermont’s favorite socialist by shady means indeed.

As for the Sand(ers) Man’s Democratic defectors, here’s how it breaks down: Two percent said they’d vote for Trump, 8% indicated they’d go the third party route, 8% colored themselves undecided, and 2% claimed they’d skip voting altogether.

Still, obviously, this leaves a hair more than three-quarters camping with Joe Biden. But the huggy, kissy, sniffy man needs all the help he can get. That 22% could prove important.

In mid-April, Bernie scolded those looking to sit out the November election in an interview with The Associated Press, offering this:

“I believe that it’s irresponsible for anybody to say, ‘Well, I disagree with Joe Biden! I disagree with Joe Biden and, therefore, I’m not going to be involved.'”

As noted by The Daily Wire, Joe’s trying to wrangle in Bernie’s best buds:

Biden has…aggressively courted Sanders voters, putting Sanders himself on some of the presidential campaign’s policy committees and enlisting Sanders’ aides in decisions about how his campaign should handle contentious issues like worker’s rights and climate change.

But there’s a new snag — Tara Reade’s sexual assault allegations, which, it would seem to me, put Joe in an even more Washington-as-usual kind of light. Moreover, it’s caused backers in general to back away:

From TDW:

In the last week, though, Biden’s campaign has hit a snag with progressives, who believe Biden is no longer the Democrats’ best bet to beat Trump because of a sexual assault allegation, leveled by a former Biden aide named Tara Reade, that surfaced earlier in April and circulated aggressively among progressives before it went public.

Business Insider reports that “as new evidence has emerged corroborating [Tara] Reade’s allegations, several prominent Sanders’ supporters and former aides have broken with Sanders and called on Biden to drop out of the 2020 race. ”

The allegations could serve as something more profound: an excuse to bail on Biden. Joe clearly has a substantial medical issue, and in my opinion, Trump will eat him alive onstage. The Reade situation could be an official reason for abandoning support of him and selecting someone else as the Dem nominee.

That remaining twenty-two percent of former Sanders supporters might be willing to root for that new candidate, depending on their platform and place in the political sphere.

The deck stacked against Joe is growing in height. Even before the Reade allegations, RedState’s Elizabeth Vaughn observed the launch of a “Never Biden” movement.

She wrote at the time:

I spoke to my cousin on Friday. He is a 64-year-old Texan who has voted for John Kerry, for Barack Obama (twice), and for Hillary Clinton. He will be voting for Trump this year. He is stunned that the Democrats would promote a candidate who is so clearly in cognitive decline.

Even in his prime, Biden was not a strong presidential candidate. He has few accomplishments. His record on foreign policy is dismal. In his 2014 memoir, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates wrote: “I think he has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.”

As we get closer to November, surely there’s much in store.

How do you see all this going? Will Biden be the man Democrats put against Trump? Will Bernie’s people fall in line at the polls?

Let us all know, in the Comments section.

-ALEX

See 3 more pieces from me:

Professor Fears the Racist, Sexist Repercussions of a Pandemic-Ending Oxford Vaccine

Gonging Gavin: An American Liberties Group Sues California’s Governor for Violating Citizens’ 1st and 14th Amendment Rights

Woman Gets Shot in the Chest, Her Implant Deflects the Bullet

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