Scarborough, de Blasio Clash Over POC Support for Biden: ‘Why Don’t Black Voters Trust’ Sanders?
Joe Scarborough pressed New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on how former Vice President Joe Biden beat out Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) on Super Tuesday.
In his appearance with Morning Joe, de Blasio defended Sanders’ level of engagement with Latino and African American voters, though Biden’s support among both groups allowed for his triumphs on Super Tuesday. De Blasio argued that Biden “cannot present a vision of change” as Sanders can, and when Willie Geist asked if he was saying the voters don’t know enough about Biden after all this time, de Blasio called it a “muddle” since Biden and Sanders are only now in a head-to-head.
“Come on, Willie. This has been 10 people, eight people. It’s been a muddle,” de Blasio said. “Every time you have a one-on-one matchup, it’s a different discussion.”
When Scarborough asked about Sanders’ record, the conversation turned back to African-American and Latino voters when de Blasio argued that Biden bringing America back to a pre-Donald Trump world isn’t good enough to satisfy them:
They’re not trying to get back to the world before Trump, the day before Trump, because it was such a wonderful world and there was so much fairness and equality in America…If you’re one of those voters who needs change in your life, who is not having a great experience for so many of them in America and want to see real change, how is Joe Biden going to convince you he will change things? Of course he’ll be better than Trump and he’s a very good, decent human being, but where is his vision of change? Joe Biden has spent a lifetime in the status quo, and I think this is a vulnerability.
Scarborough countered that people are tired of Trump’s “absolute chaos” and Biden’s promise of returning to normalcy is “a pretty damn good place to start.”
He asked de Blasio “Why is it that Bernie Sanders does so poorly among black voters? Why is it that he spent the past four years trying to expand that base of support among black voters, and yet things have only gotten worse for him?”
“I think for every candidate, you have to constantly improve your game and your work,” de Blasio began before Scarborough cut in to ask, “Why hasn’t he? He’s had four years. He didn’t even ask Jim Clyburn for his support.”
“Joe, I want to put that aside because I think it was well known where Jim Clyburn was going,” de Blasio answered.
“No it wasn’t,” Scarborough said. “Jim Clyburn — the week before he made his endorsement — still wasn’t sure which direction he was going.”
Scarborough and de Blasio continued to go back and forth on this, with the former asking “why don’t black voters trust [Sanders]?”
Watch above, via MSNBC.
