Presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders said he is in talks with the Democratic National Committee following a fight with them that led to the firing of a Sanders campaign staffer accused of improperly accessing Hillary Clinton’s campaign voter data.
“We’re trying to work with the DNC to put this whole thing behind us,” Sanders said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday.
But Sanders worked to shift focus to his central message.
“[To] the American people there are far more important issues having to do with the disappearance of the American middle class and huge income and wealth inequality and climate change,” the Vermont senator said.
After the data breach, the DNC temporarily suspended Sanders’ campaign from accessing its own voter database. The campaign in turn responded by filing a lawsuit. Since then, tensions between the Democratic Party and those aligned with the Sanders campaign have been high. Sanders aides have accused the DNC of using the spat to help Clinton.
Asked Sunday if he believes the DNC is giving him “a fair shot,” Sanders did not say it is, but tried to move on.
“We have had our differences of opinions with the DNC. But at the end of the day, the DNC, Hillary Clinton and myself, we want to defeat right-wing extremism in this country. So we’re trying to work out our differences of opinion.”
DNC Chairwoman, Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, appeared on “Meet the Press” after Sanders. She did not address the data dispute.
Wasserman Schultz instead joined with Sanders, attacking Donald Trump and working to tie the GOP presidential field to the billionaire.
Trump has brought the GOP field to the “lowest depths in tone and rhetroic I’ve ever seen in a presidential campaign,” she said.
