During the 1986 race for governor of Vermont, Bernie Sanders bristled at the popularity of the Democratic incumbent, Madeleine Kunin. Sanders, who was running against her as an independent, saw himself as a leader, and viewed Kunin as a lightweight.
“She does very well on television,’’ he told one interviewer. “She has an excellent press secretary.’’
But really, he said another time, the governor’s appeal came down to one trait.
“Many people are excited because she’s the first woman governor,’’ he said. “But after that, there ain’t much.’’
Sanders has long presented himself as an issues-oriented, plain-speaking politician from rural New England, now seeking the presidency with promise of a political revolution. But his combative side has emerged as the Democratic race has tightened and Hillary Clinton has sharpened her rhetoric.
The result is a far harsher tone in the Democratic campaign and a transformed Senator Sanders, who is now making the kinds of sharper-edged attacks that some of his advisers regretted he did not deploy sooner. But his aggressiveness also worries some supporters who were powerfully drawn to his positive persona that forswore politics as usual.
The senator’s assertiveness was on vivid display in Thursday’s debate with Clinton before the New York primary Tuesday, which Sanders must win big to dent Clinton’s strong lead in the delegates needed for the nomination. But he is also seeking to match the vigorous jabs from her aides and allies, who ignored Sanders for much of last year and are now assailing his policy ideas and leadership abilities on a near-daily basis. His advisers say he is reacting to the New York political environment as well.
“Political combat is more restrained in places like Iowa and New Hampshire, but it’s completely different in New York, and Bernie has no problem defending his ideas in a tough way,’’ said Tad Devine, a senior adviser for his campaign.
Clinton is now trying to hold off Sanders while not alienating his supporters, whom she would need in the general election. But she is also refusing to back down, and their spiky clashes are suddenly making for a more explosive and unpredictable race.
More than anything, the recent Sanders broadsides reflect a political strategy he has carried out in previous campaigns: the use of blunt criticisms, sarcastic asides, and a thundering style against his opponents.
In the 1986 race, Sanders argued that he would be a strong feminist and do more for women than Kunin had. While granting that Kunin was “not corrupt,’’ he questioned if she had the “courage’’ he had. He repeatedly challenged her credentials as a fellow progressive, using some of the same language he aims at Clinton. In the end, he damaged Kunin politically, as some Clinton supporters and political analysts think he may do in the current race.
“In a tough fight, Bernie is hardly the all-positive, all-substance guy that he claims to be,’’ said Garrison Nelson, a longtime political science professor at the University of Vermont.
Kunin was not the only foe that Sanders attacked with insinuations, as opposed to the more overtly negative television ads that Sanders has forsworn. In his 1990 race for Congress, he frequently laid political bait for his Republican opponent and relished watching him stumble. And in his 2006 Senate campaign, Sanders relentlessly linked his moderate Republican opponent with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, and accused him of running “the most negative, dishonest campaign in the history of the state of Vermont.’’
While such tactics are not unusual, Sanders has long tried to claim the high road. Yet if his past opponents remember anything about him, it’s Bernie the brawler.
“The way he kept tagging me as a typical rich guy who only cared about rich Republicans — it was very tough, and very effective,’’ said Richard Tarrant, a software executive who was the GOP Senate nominee in 2006 and ran many aggressive TV ads. “Bernie knew that I earned my money myself, that my wealth was first-generation. But that didn’t matter.’’
