Bernie Sanders picked a fight with the Democratic establishment, and the establishment is striking back. As he faces the toughest onslaught of his political life over the next 11 days before the Iowa caucuses, Sanders will have to go it nearly alone.
In a pitched battle, Sanders would be hopelessly outgunned. But the Vermont senator is waging the public relations version of guerrilla warfare. Instead of taking on Hillary Clinton’s superior forces head on, Team Sanders is betting on the ability to pick his battles, use the issue terrain to his advantage, and turn the Clinton machine’s size and strength against her.
It’s an unorthodox strategy that leaves Sanders often on defense, letting Clinton and her expansive communications infrastructure start new fights every day that could win over undecided voters. But it’s likely his best option given her superior resources, and it can help fire up his base. The more he’s attacked, the more it reinforces to supporters his narrative that he’s an outsider whom the establishment views as a threat.
“We’ve expected that this is the way they would react, by lashing out left and right, and we’re ready for it,” said Communications Director Michael Briggs. “We don’t think they’re doing themselves any good, but don’t tell themselves that.”
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On paper, it’s not even a fair fight. On Clinton’s team in the battle for hearts and minds are the majority of Democratic Party power brokers: more than 100 members of Congress; nearly 40 senators; a former president; nearly all of the powerful party-aligned interest groups and labor unions; and a large swaths of the party’s donors, operatives and policy experts.
On his side, Sanders has a rapper, a former Ohio state senator, an inflammatory academic, a couple of congressmen and a handful of liberal grassroots groups.
He does have some powerful other assets, including plenty of money, which he has now used to outspend Clinton on TV advertising. He has a massive army of committed grassroots supporters, eager to convert friends and family and evangelize on social media. And he has incredibly high approval rating among Democrats — 91 percent in New Hampshire and 89 percent in Iowa, according to a recent CNN and Des Moines Register poll, respectively.
His popularity, his aides believe, makes Clinton’s attacks risk backfiring by turning off voters or caucus-goers.
But Sanders is sorely lacking Democratic validators, who can defend him when attacked and vouch for him to a party he only recently joined formally. While Barack Obama ran an insurgent campaign in 2008, he at least had some powerful inside players to back him up. On many days, the only people defending Sanders in print or on the airwaves are people on his payroll or the candidate himself.
That’s OK, his aides say, since they believe Sanders is his own best messenger and he can fend for himself. And they want to be judicious in which battles they pick, always trying to steer the debate back to the friendlier terrain of Wall Street, climate change and campaign finance, and away from issues that favor Clinton.
“We just can’t get sucked into this universe that they want to pull us into of nasty negative exchanges,” said top Sanders strategist Tad Devine. “One of the things you want to do when your opponent is on the attack is not let them dictate the terms of engagement.”
Devine pointed to the example of Sanders’ heated 2006 Senate campaign, when one of the wealthiest men in Vermont ran against Sanders with a sharply negative campaign, including one ad accusing Sanders of voting to protect child molesters. Senate Democratic leaders advised Sanders to respond in kind with tough hits, Devine said, but instead he took an above-the-fray approach with a response ad saying, “I can’t match [my opponent’s] money ad for ad, but I’ll let the truth speak for itself.”
But of course, a presidential race is not a Vermont Senate campaign, and the Clinton campaign is unlikely to level a charge as ham-fisted and repellent as accusing Sanders of defending child molesters.









