HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. — Worried Democrats on Monday intensified their assault against the party’s presidential front-runner, Bernie Sanders, as the Vermont senator marched toward South Carolina’s weekend primary eyeing a knockout blow.
At least three leading candidates, Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg and Mike Bloomberg, reinforced their anti-Sanders rhetoric with paid attack ads for the first time. And a new political group was spending big to undermine Sanders’ standing with African American voters.
“Socialist Bernie Sanders is promising a lot of free stuff,” says a brochure sent to 200,000 black voters in South Carolina by The Big Tent Project, a new organization trying to derail Sanders’ candidacy. “Nominating Bernie means we reelect Trump. We can’t afford Bernie Sanders.”
The multi-pronged broadside just five days before South Carolina’s first-in-the-South primary represents the Democrats’ most aggressive attempt to knock Sanders down. It reflects growing concern within his party that the self-described democratic socialist is tightening his grip on the presidential nomination while they fear he’s too extreme to defeat President Donald Trump this fall.
It also underscores the precarious state of Biden’s campaign. The former vice president has long been viewed as the unquestioned front-runner in South Carolina because of his support from black voters. But as the contest nears, Sanders is also making a strong play here. If he can eat into Biden’s base of support, that would raise fundamental questions about the future of Biden’s candidacy.
Sanders has shifted new staff into the state from Nevada in the last 24 hours, expanded his South Carolina advertising and added events to his schedule.
Sanders senior adviser Jeff Weaver said there was an “air of desperation” to the fresh attacks on his candidate.
“You’ve got candidates, you’ve got super PACs, all piling on to stop Bernie Sanders,” Weaver said. “They know he has the momentum in the race.”
Biden still predicted he would win “by plenty” in Saturday’s contest, the first with a sizable black population to weigh in.
Beyond South Carolina, polls suggest Sanders will perform well when more than a dozen states vote in the March 3 Super Tuesday contests. That’s when critics fear Sanders could build an insurmountable delegate lead.
Sanders was the focus of Buttigieg’s first attack ad of the 2020 campaign. In the ad, which began running Monday as part of the former South Bend mayor’s multimillion-dollar South Carolina advertising campaign, Buttigieg highlights Sanders’ call for a government-financed health care system as an example of the Democratic front-runner’s “polarization.”
Biden released an online ad accusing Sanders of trying to undermine President Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign with a possible primary challenge.
Sanders, of course, ultimately did not challenge Obama from the left.
“When it comes to building on President Obama’s legacy, Bernie Sanders just can’t be trusted,” the Biden ad says.