Appearing exclusively on Thursday night’s edition of MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show, Democratic presidential candidate and socialist Bernie Sanders was lobbed one softball question after another that included Maddow gushing that “[y]ou’ve been preparing for this whole life” and wondering if the success he’s had thus far was “energizing” or “tiring and overwhelming.”
The questioning was nice and easy from the start with Maddow reminiscing that the pair had spoke both “before you got into the race” and “right after you jumped in the race” so she wanted to know: “How do you feel now compared to then?”
With the mood of the interview already set, Maddow went right to the heart of matter and fawned over the socialist candidate and the reception he’s received:
Do you feel – and this is a little bit personal. I don't mean it in a prying way, but this process and how much attention you've gotten and how much success you’ve had. Is it energizing to you or is it tiring and overwhelming to you?
While Sanders admitted that he’s felt tired some days from constantly being on the campaign trail, he portrayed it as a huge positive considering: “[I]t is an unbelievable moment to go to Portland, Oregon where the Trailblazers play, you know? And look out at 28,000 people, third tier, and say why are these guys here? Oh, I'm speaking. Now, that is really mind blowing.”
Maddow then wadded into the nitty gritty details of getting on ballots and having sufficient campaign staff across a plethora of states, but she prefaced it by first declaring to Sanders that he’s “been preparing for this your whole life in some ways.”
On the subject of the crowds he’s drawn and the surge in the polls against Hillary Clinton, Maddow wondered if Sanders’ campaign could be the start of something even larger:
You’ve turned out these big crowds. You inspired 200,000 volunteers. You moved people. If that does not translate this year into you winning the nomination, and I know I hear you when you're saying you're in it to win it and I believe you. If you don’t win the nomination, will you lead those people or try to inspire those people to do something else?
Using his visit to Liberty University on Monday as a springboard, Maddow wondered if he’s “starting to think about a plan...to appeal to people who think of themselves not as liberal” but rather Republicans who “cannot stomach somebody like Mr. Trump as their nominee.”
In the final portion of the interview, the pair discussed the Department of Veterans Affairs (V.A.) and the scandal that development that cabinet department in 2014 with Maddow fretting to Sanders about the possibility that a Republican elected president in 2016 would “privatize the V.A.” or kill it. Spinning it as only a socialist could, Sanders touted the so-called benefits of a large, bureaucratic agency that should be expanded (despite any problems it may have):
[I]t is very easy – the V.A. has 152 million centers and some 800 community based outreach clinics. Everyday, there's a problem, but everyday, there's a problem in any and every medical facility in America and if all you talk about are the negative things that people get a certain view of the V.A....Now, what we try to do and have done is put $5 billion into the V.A. to increase the number of doctors, nurses, and other medical personnel that they need so we can make sure never again will veterans be put on long waiting lines.
To cap off the interview, Maddow put a bow on her sit down with the socialist candidate by telling him, in part, how “it is a remarkable thing, as a liberal, to see the success you’re having”:
You did not know that you would be at this point in your campaign when you launched it and I know, because I can tell. I didn't know. It is a remarkable thing, as a liberal, to see the success you're having, the resonance that your message is having and I don’t know what’s going to happen in the campaign long term, but good luck to you sir.
It should be noted that this was far from the first time Maddow had kind words for Sanders and his campaign. On July 28, she expressed excitement over the fact that a Sanders for President bumper stick was found in the northern Alaskan town of Deadhorse.
Shortly after Sanders announced his campaign, Maddow took to the airwaves on May 27 to chide the media for treating Sanders “almost like a gadfly [and] somebody who exists only to pester Hillary Clinton to move to the left during the primaries.”
The relevant portions of the transcript from MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show on September 17 can be found below.
MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show
September 17, 2015
9:22 p.m. Eastern
RACHEL MADDOW: We talked on the show before you got in the race and we talked right after you jumped in the race. How do you feel now compared to them?
(....)
MADDOW: Do you feel – and this is a little bit personal. I don't mean it in a prying way, but this process and how much attention you've gotten and how much success you’ve had. Is it energizing to you or is it tiring and overwhelming to you?
SANDERS: It’s both. I mean, it is an unbelievable moment to go to Portland, Oregon where the Trailblazers play, you know? And look out at 28,000 people, third tier, and say why are these guys here? Oh, I'm speaking. Now, that is really mind blowing. On the other hand, if you go through a month – 30 days and no days off and it gets you a little bit. So, I got a day job as United States Senator for Vermont, but all in all, the kind of support that we're getting, the kind of energy and the kind of young people that are coming out the, you know, that energizes me a lot.
MADDOW: You've been preparing for this your whole life in some ways. Let me ask you about what you raised there about kind of scaling up. Your campaign put out a mass hiring call for campaign coordinators to focus on Massachusetts, Georgia, Colorado, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Alabama, and Arkansas. All these Super Tuesday states. I mean, have – should we take that to mean you think you've been out organized a little bit in that state? In those states or you never thought you would have to do that?
(....)
MADDOW: Did you learn anything from your admittedly somewhat unexpected success in Iowa and New Hampshire that has taught you how you want to organize in new states that you’re just getting into in a more serious way now?
(....)
MADDOW: You’ve turned out these big crowds. You inspired 200,000 volunteers. You moved people. If that does not translate this year into you winning the nomination, and I know I hear you when you're saying you're in it to win it and I believe you. If you don’t win the nomination, will you lead those people or try to inspire those people to do something else?
(....)
MADDOW: You went to Liberty University this week. Very ideological unfriendly territory. You were – I listened to the speech. You were very respectful to your audience. They greeted you very respectfully.
SANDERS: Yes they did.
MADDOW: With Donald Trump so dominant in the Republican field, I wonder if you are starting to think about a plan for trying to appeal to people who think of themselves not as liberals, not even as centrists, but as moderate conservatives that usually think of themselves as Republicans but they cannot stomach somebody like Mr. Trump as their nominee. Do you have a crossover appeal plan?
(....)
MADDOW: Vermont Senator, Democratic candidate for president of the United States Bernie Sanders. You did not know that you would be at this point in your campaign when you launched it and I know, because I can tell. I didn't know. It is a remarkable thing, as a liberal, to see the success you're having, the resonance that your message is having and I don’t know what’s going to happen in the campaign long term, but good luck to you sir.
