After a brief yet bitter battle with the Democratic National Committee over access to voter data files, Vermont Sen. Bernard Sanders said Sunday he is looking to move past the “differences” he has with the party organization and instead focus on income inequality and other important issues facing the country.
Mr. Sanders, a 2016 presidential candidate, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that his campaign is in “negotiations” with the DNC.
The Sanders campaign earlier in December fired a staffer accused of accessing data belonging to the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign. After that incident, the DNC temporarily suspended the Sanders campaign’s access to the party’s voter file, which contains information on tens of millions of voters.
The Sanders campaign then filed a lawsuit and quickly had its access restored, but the ordeal fueled the notion that the DNC favors Mrs. Clinton in the 2016 race and was all too eager to sabotage Mr. Sanders.
Asked directly whether the DNC is working against his campaign, Mr. Sanders chose not to engage in a public war of words.
“We have had our differences of opinion with the DNC. But at the end of the day, the DNC, Hillary Clinton and myself, we want to defeat right-wring extremism in this country,” he told NBC. “So we’re trying to work out our differences of opinion.”
Mr Sanders also stressed that he believes the American people are much more concerned about income inequality and other issues than they are about internal DNC disputes.
Strangely, DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz appeared on “Meet the Press” immediately following Mr. Sanders, but was not asked about the voter data incident or the DNC’s relationship with the Sanders campaign.
• Ben Wolfgang can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.
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