Sanders’ volunteers ‘feeling the Bern’ against odds in S.C.
A group of Boy Scouts on a hike walk past a Bernie Sanders yard sign at Polo Park in Columbia, S.C., where a polling station is set up for the South Carolina Democratic presidential primary on Saturday, Feb. 27, 2016. Credit: Getty Images / Mark Makela
COLUMBIA, S.C. — The small, worn house along a busy thoroughfare was packed with supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders on the morning of the South Carolina Democratic primary where their candidate is 20 points behind in most polls.
“I’ve been talking to undecideds,” said Roger Bouchard, 60, of Columbia as he showed up Saturday morning for his latest weekend of volunteering for Sanders.
He’s spent just about every weekend since April knocking on doors, handing out leaflets and talking to voters in flea markets. He wears his Bernie T-shirt and buttons that include “Bernie: The Real Deal,” “Democratic Socialists of America,” and one of the Statue of Liberty with the message, “Refugees Welcome.”
On Saturday, he said of the 49 doors he knocked on by 10:30 a.m., 19 were strong supporters of Sanders and a few were still undecided.
“I think the polls are way off,” said Bouchard, a former New Englander long familiar with the Vermont senator. “There’s a grassroots thing going on. It’s under the radar.”
He is counting on slow but steadily rising support for Sanders to eventually win the Democratic nomination. But he knows former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has deep political roots in South Carolina dating to her volunteer work for a children’s defense fund after law school and through the administration of her husband, President Bill Clinton.
“They’ve been here before and they have that history,” Bouchard said. “With Bernie, all you have to do is go to one of his speeches … it’s not memorized. It’s from the heart.”
He accuses the Democratic and media establishment of muffling Sanders’ liberal, democratic socialist message to combat a “rigged” economic and political system funded by Wall Street.
“If he ties Hillary in South Carolina, I call that a win for Bernie,” he said.
“I just absolutely adore the guy,” said Sanders volunteer Brenda Roy, 45, of Columbia. “To me, honesty is everything. Integrity is everything.”
She’s spent her weekends for most of nine months working for Sanders. She wears a campaign button — “Bernie, y’all” — and a T-shirt in which Sanders is drawn as Beatle John Lennon once did in a self-portrait. The message: “Imagine.”
Michael Gormley has worked for Newsday since 2013, covering state government, politics and issues. He has covered Albany since 2001.
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