Bernie Sanders slammed the Iowa Democratic Party for botching the first-in-the-nation Democratic presidential contest last week but stopped short of saying the debacle was intended to “hurt” his candidacy.
The Vermont senator appeared on CNN’s State of the Union Sunday to discuss his 2020 White House bid, and the Democratic Party’s national embarrassment after its Iowa arm took days to name a winner after its Monday caucuses. Sanders said he does not suspect that Iowa’s fumble is part of a larger scheme by the Democratic National Committee to sink his candidacy, despite the suggestions of some of his campaign surrogates.
“All I can say about Iowa is it was an embarrassment. It was a disgrace to the good people of Iowa, who take their responsibilities in the caucuses very seriously. They screwed it up badly is what the Iowa Democratic Party did,” Sanders said.
DNC Chairman Tom Perez called for Iowa’s caucus results to be recanvassed on Thursday, three days after the caucus took place. Former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner, co-chairwoman of Sanders’s campaign, said Perez’s announcement looked “fairly intentional.”
“I find it ironic he wants to recanvass. Where was he days and days before that? Nowhere to be found,” Turner said.
On CNN, Sanders shied away from Turner’s comments, saying that it is “not my impression” that the DNC was attempting to tank his presidential run.
“We’re taking on Trump and the Republican establishment, and there are a lot in the Democratic establishment who are not, to say the least, enthusiastic about Bernie Sanders,” Sanders said. “But I’m not casting any aspersions — any political aspersions. The incompetence in Iowa was extraordinary.”
Former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Peter Buttigieg was eventually named winner of the Iowa caucuses with a razor-thin lead over Sanders.
