When Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) announced three months ago that he’d seek the Democratic presidential nomination, the New York Times described him as a “grumpy grandfather-type.”
That caricature has persisted — most notably in a recent Washington Post listicle with the irresistible headline: “7 ways Bernie Sanders reminds us of our grumpy grandpa.”
According to some who have worked closely with Sanders over the years, “grumpy grandpa” doesn’t even begin to describe it. They characterize the senator as rude, short-tempered and, occasionally, downright hostile. Though Sanders has spent much of his life fighting for working Vermonters, they say he mistreats the people working for him.
“As a supervisor, he was unbelievably abusive,” says one former campaign staffer, who claims to have endured frequent verbal assaults. The double standard was clear: “He did things that, if he found out that another supervisor was doing in a workplace, he would go after them. You can’t treat employees that way.”
Like several others quoted in this column, the campaign worker would speak only on the condition of anonymity, saying that to do otherwise would constitute “career suicide” in a small state such as Vermont. But others echoed the former employee’s story, saying the senator is prone to fits of anger.
“Bernie was an asshole,” says a Democratic insider who worked with Sanders on the campaign trail. “Just unnecessarily an asshole.”
“He yelled in meetings all the time,” says one of Sanders’ former Senate staffers. “He’d yell, ‘I don’t want to hear excuses! I want to get it done!'”
Victims of his management style aren’t entirely negative about their former boss.
“I think he’s got a ton of conviction,” the same former Senate staffer says. “I just think he’s kind of harsh to a fault. He’s so focused on his issues that he doesn’t have a softer side. I don’t think he’s a very nice man.”
A former House staffer put it more diplomatically: “If there’s a thing that I think is regrettable about Bernie, in the end, his soft touch is lacking.”
In a statement provided to Seven Days, Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs defended his boss.
“Sen. Sanders has had very positive relations with people who have worked with him, many of them for decades,” Briggs wrote. “Some people who were part of his team when he was the mayor of Burlington went on to his House and Senate staffs.”
Briggs added that Sanders finds it “unfortunate that too many journalists and publications do not focus on the major issues of our time.” Instead, he wrote, “Too many writers and publications look at politics as a soap opera and engage in gossip and personal attacks.”
Call it gossip if you will, but Sanders is, after all, running for president. If he wins, he’ll become the boss of some 4.2 million federal employees, have a standing army at his disposal and, you know, hold the nuclear launch codes. So an analysis of his management style and temper might be reasonable.
Criticism of Sanders’ leadership abilities is nothing new. Steve Rosenfeld, a former Vermont journalist who served as Sanders’ press secretary during his 1990 House campaign, wrote a book about his first successful statewide bid. In Making History in Vermont, Rosenfeld levels a tough assessment at his former boss, who passed him over for a congressional job at the campaign’s end.
“At his best, Sanders is a skilled reader and manipulator of people and events,” Rosenfeld wrote. “At his worst, he falls prey to his own emotions, is unable to practice what he preaches (though he would believe otherwise) and exudes a contempt for those he derides, including his staff.”
Rosenfeld quotes Sanders himself in the book as saying, “Some people say I am very hard to work with. They say I can be a real son of a bitch. They say I can be nasty, I don’t know how to get along with people. Well, maybe there’s some truth to it.”
Reached in San Francisco, where he now lives, Rosenfeld readily admits that his portrait of the candidate may be dated: “We all, over 25 years, get better at things and change.” He points out that whatever managerial failings Sanders may have suffered from clearly haven’t hobbled his career.
“There is a long line of people who can tell you anecdotes about Bernie being gruff and rude, but part of him being gruff and rude has gotten him as far as he’s gotten,” Rosenfeld says.
Sen. Anthony Pollina (P/D-Washington) joined Sanders’ staff soon after Rosenfeld left it. He chalks up any early missteps to the stress his boss faced as a freshman member of Congress without a major party affiliation.
“I think, early on, he was kind of getting his feet on the ground. None of us had ever run a congressional office before,” Pollina says. “He was under a lot of pressure to prove himself. A lot of people expected him to fail.”
While Pollina says he never witnessed Sanders losing his temper at fellow staffers, he sympathizes with those who felt the job was a grind.
“He is a very hard worker himself. I mean, he is at it 24-7 — and that’s really no exaggeration,” Pollina says. “He works really, really hard, and he expects the people who work for him to work really, really hard.”
George Thabault, who worked for Sanders when he was mayor of Burlington, sees that as a virtue, comparing it to “what you would expect from a CEO.”
“He was a good boss and a demanding boss, in a way,” says Thabault, now an auditor for the state Department of Vermont Health Access. “Sometimes you had to remind him that tomorrow’s a holiday, so that 4:30 meeting — maybe the team won’t be in the best mood.”
In his statement, Briggs wrote, “It is true that in taking on some of the most important issues facing our country that he demands a lot, but no more than he demands of himself.”
Even outside his staff, Sanders is well known in Vermont as a serious micromanager. Stories are legion of his calls to campaign aides en route to events to harangue them about the number of hot dogs and buns they’d bought.
“He is his own chief of staff,” remarks one Democratic official who has worked with Sanders’ office. “He’s his own cook and bottle washer.”
“It just never struck me as a hierarchy,” adds Luke Albee, a former chief of staff to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.). “It just struck me as being very linear, with him being the driving force on stuff.”
According to Sanders’ former Senate staffer, his tendency to micromanage often hobbled the office’s work.
“Everything was done at the last second,” that person said. “He made all the decisions.”
But Darren Springer, a former energy adviser and chief counsel to Sanders, says he appreciated that the office environment was “collegial.”
“Bernie and I talked frequently, and I could call him, email him or knock on his office door anytime,” says Springer, who now serves as Gov. Peter Shumlin‘s chief of staff. Such access, he added, is “critical” to a legislative staffer to do his or her job.
Sanders’ bristly nature is no secret to the public. Unlike most politicians — and practically all presidential candidates — he avoids personal interactions with voters whenever possible, preferring to make his points behind a podium. Occasionally, when his signature monologues are disrupted, anger gets the best of him.
When anti-Israeli protesters confronted him at a Cabot town hall meeting last August and interrupted him repeatedly, Sanders lost his cool.
“Excuse me,” he snapped. “Shut up! You don’t have the microphone.”
Sanders seemed similarly frustrated when Black Lives Matter protesters interrupted him at a Netroots Nation conference in Phoenix last month. Though he did not erupt, he “flashed with annoyance,” according to Time, and tried to talk over the protesters.
“Black lives, of course, matter. I spent 50 years of my life fighting for civil rights and for dignity,” he said. “But if you don’t want me to be here, that’s OK. I don’t want to out-scream people.”
If there’s one group Sanders particularly enjoys beating up, it’s the media. Ever since reporters wrote off his early foray into electoral politics in the 1970s, he has considered them corrupt, shallow, stupid or a combination thereof.
During his unsuccessful 1988 campaign for Congress, Sanders famously towed a CBS “60 Minutes” camera crew into the Associated Press’ Montpelier bureau to ask its writers, “How come you never cover my press conferences?” Two years later, as Rosenfeld recounts in his book, Sanders accused the AP of bias during a press conference on the Statehouse lawn, drawing rebukes from the rest of the press corps.
“When you’re a politician dealing with the media, life is difficult,” Sanders later wrote in his 1998 autobiography, Outsider in the House. “If you’re getting screwed by the media, you don’t have much recourse.”
To Chris Graff, who served as AP bureau chief at the time, it was all a bit much.
“I felt he was overly antagonistic,” Graff says, noting that the senator hates the media “probably at about the same level” as he hates billionaires. Graff is now vice president for communications at National Life Group.
Says Rosenfeld, who had to mend fences with the AP after Sanders’ Statehouse tirade, “He thought I was a shitty press secretary because I wouldn’t yell at Sue Allen, Chris Graff and the Associated Press.” Allen, then an AP scribe, now serves as Shumlin’s deputy chief of staff.
Years later, during a tough interview with Vermont Public Radio’s Jane Lindholm, Sanders hung up on the “Vermont Edition” host while recording an interview. Lindholm had been grilling him on a fundraising email he sent just three days after a gunman killed six people in Tucson and injured then-congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.
“It surprised me,” Lindholm says. “It’s unusual for a politician to hang up on you.”
But Lindholm says she doesn’t hold it against him.
“I don’t think he sounded good in that moment to listeners, but I didn’t think he was being rude to me,” she says, adding that she appreciates that Sanders doesn’t try to “sweet talk” the press. “Bernie’s Bernie … I don’t know that his being prickly to journalists is a bad thing.”
The public may not think so, either.
In recent weeks, Sanders has ramped up his criticism of the press — and received a largely positive response. A video of him berating reporters during an Iowa press conference last week has already attracted half a million hits. And a recent New York Times interview in which he criticized a reporter for asking about media coverage of Hillary Clinton‘s hair went viral.
Asked Monday in Conway, N.H., whether he thought it was “a winning issue to go after the media,” Sanders said he did not. Then he jabbed his right index finger at the reporter who asked the question, CNN’s Dan Merica, and asked the reporter whether he thought he covered climate change, poverty and African American unemployment sufficiently.
“Are you gonna discuss it?” Sanders demanded. “What I am asking you is: Help me! I mean, I’m not taking any of this personally. The American people want a discussion of the real issues.”
Take it from the boss.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Anger Management”
This article appears in The Back to School Issue 2015.
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Politics is serious business. When you’re part of a campaign, there are standards of quality that must be met. Bernie, for example, never runs a negative attack ad. His campaign staff needs to accomadate this, and other criteria for a successful campaign. When people’s livelihoods are at stake, the people making the decisions are not going to accept shoddy work. This means getting angry, but it also means being reasonable.
The question we should be asking is not why is Sanders angry, but how does he express it? As some of Sanders staff have expressed, much of his frustration is well placed. Considering he’s been in Congress for over 22 years, I would be inclined to agree.
Sounds like someone who can be an effective executive.
Anonymous, unnamed sources say this reporter likes to use quotes from anonymous unnamed sources. Said one former unnamed colleague, “Yeah, this guy is a real douche and you can quote me on that as long as you don’t say my name.” Another unnamed former colleague said, “Some people question if the quotes he gets are real. It’s a tough call because I’m not even real.” Anonymous unnamed sources wonder if this is a breach of journalistic ethics or just sloppy reporting.
I don’t really think this article is fair. For one thing, the headline is an inaccurate and cheap swipe. Bernie doesn’t have an anger management problem, or a short fuse, or whatever. What he does have is a low tolerance for BS (which is one of the reasons why voters like him, incidentally). I also think it’s kind of lame to quote a bunch of “unnamed sources.”
Speaking as a former Bernie staffer, I can confirm he is not an easy person to work for– he is very particular and wants things how he wants them– but I never once felt abused. On the contrary, I always felt really valued and like my hard work was appreciated. Bernie has exacting standards. He doesn’t like mistakes. He expects staff to work as hard as he does. If you want to work for Bernie, he sets the bar pretty high. But frankly– shouldn’t he? Bernie is very serious about trying to make our state and country a better place for working families. He wants serious, committed people working for him. Trying to say he’s doesn’t “practice what he preaches” in terms of workers rights is ridiculous and unsubstantiated editorializing on the part of Mr. Heintz.
Set aside the inflammatory baseless attention-grabbing headline, and discount the vague comments by anonymous sources (“He’s an asshole!” — what does that mean, and if so who cares??) and isn’t this what we would expect from the CEO of the most powerful country in the world? Does the POTUS really need a “soft touch”?
Given the actual content of the article, the headline and bias expressed within the article really shows some serious one-sided reporting. This is not — here are the facts do with them what you will. PH is really trying to make an issue out of nothing. “Anger Management” — Really? That’s a pretty serious phrase to throw around.
This a big “Who gives a shit”. This piece, and the one in Digger about Bernie’s son being born out of wedlock are two of stupidest pieces written about Bernie. I guess you have to give Heintz credit because most of his other reporting is referencing articles from other sources, like HuffPo but a tiny bit less lazy. I guess the Vermont press feels they have to say something original about Bernie even though they failed to even attempt anything previous to his running for president. Just like the Digger article, this one will be batted around twitter for a while and fade into the sunset. But every now and then some bot will post it like happens with the rape essay. Maybe Heintz can promote it like the Digger reporter did, encouraging people to retweet it. Pulitzer Prize, here we come.
Once again, the brainwashed friends of Kim Jong Un will tolerate no criticism of their Dear Leader. Indeed, you are not allowed to speak a truth if it does not reflect glory on the Dear Leader.
Of course he’s an a-hole. He’s rude. He’s grumpy. He’s narcissistic. He’s idealistic to fault. But he gets things done. Just like any other megalomaniac. And the people who work for him complain about him… and so many stick around for years. It’s too bad he shunned Nader in 2000 & 2004; he’s so much like him in so many ways, politically and otherwise.
This article seems like an attempt to keep up with the national muckraking of Donald Trump. Not politically correct? Get lambasted by the media. For every major candidate there are “anonymous” sources ready to line up to deride them. If they go unnamed, it’s our grapes. Not that Bernie or Bernie’s handler Phil Fiermonte wouldn’t know who they are, of course.
Who else misses Peter Freyne? Shay Totten? They both used to cut through the BS, rather than focus on it. They’d do something different from the rest of the “news” flock.
“But he gets things done.”
Please name them. He’s been in Congress almost 25 years. Please name all the bills he’s initiated and passed.
WHY are you guys writing this article. Are you also in the gossip business of just creating headlines?
The end does not justify the means. Diplomacy (“soft touch” if you will) is critical to a job like President or any other leadership position. If you can’t get your point across, or get results without being rude, shouting, micro managing, etc., you’re certainly not Presidential material. Furthermore, there is a great Chinese proverb which I’ve found to be true almost always: “He who debates the loudest has the weakest case”.
Briggs added that Sanders finds it “unfortunate that too many journalists and publications do not focus on the major issues of our time.” Instead, he wrote, “Too many writers and publications look at politics as a soap opera and engage in gossip and personal attacks.”
Sums up this article.
we’ll expect one next week on trumpshighly effective management style
So untrue! I work for him and I think this article is BS!
This is mine and Bernie’s free local weekly… They seem to be on a relentless crusade to impugn and discredit him with negatively nuanced nit picky gossip. This is like the 6th or 7th week in a row that they’ve come up with infuriating articles on the man most of us here love and respect more than anyone we’ve ever known in politics (won his last election with 71% statewide, probably over 90% in Burlington).
They seem to be on special close-up-inside assignment to pick through Bernie’s garbage, probably hiding in the trees behind his house right now. The only week this wasn’t true was when it was reported he was actually winning in the latest poll in N.H. That week there was nothing on Bernie! If you can’t say something nasty, don’t say anything at all I guess… Total sell-outs licking corporate-master boot, just like the rest of the lame-stream media. I expected something better but I guess I’m not surprised… Ugh!
This paper is in a position to actually be intimately informative since they are local. Instead they seem to have chosen the path of sensationalist, negatively nuanced gossip. To be fair they have had a couple of neutral articles and one positive page with glowing quotes about Bernie from people who worked with him, which, by the way, directly contradicts this silly article with over 20 people who let their real names be used.
They’re in a position to do so much more… Like a substantive discussion of the issues as they’ve played out over Bernie’s career, for example… Yet they chosen to do so much less. Like I said, disappointing. I wonder if maybe they’re expecting a dog biscuit or a pat on the head from some national syndicate or the DNC. 🙁
I’ve always respected that Bernie was busy working on important issues and had no time for glad handing. Even seeing him on the street, you knew not to bother him because he was clearly deep in thought on issues to make our lives better. I can see this paper exploring this part of his personality, but it comes off as trite and lacking in any depth into Bernie’s complex character. I think as Bernie’s hometown paper, they at least owe him that. I also know that if you need something as a constituent, you just need to call his office.
Abuse of staff by a Democrat or Republican: it’s heinous, disgusting, shameful, and typical.
Abuse of staff by a Progressive: it’s a sign of commendable passion and commitment to noble goals! To be forgiven! And how dare Seven Days report on it?!
During the early years when Seven Days was first published, I used to grab a copy as quickly as possible. Some good journalism and interesting articles.
Now, not so much. Lots of fluff pieces and not a whole lot of substance. Only time I grab that rag now is when I need paper to line my cat’s litter box.
Well, if you can’t take the heat get out of the kitchen. Seems 7 days should be cranking the heat …… Pore reporting, !BY PAUL HEINTZ……. Not the first time either. Bunch of gotcha junk reporting.
Should have done a piece on passion and how that makes the cream of the crop rise to the occasion.
Good job, Paul.
Oh, heaven forbid we put a man in office with a bad temper. I cannot recall any examples of such a person in the highest office in the U.S., except for most of them. Clearly Richard Nixon was a man at peace with the world. LBJ wouldn’t hurt a horse fly on his ranch…
Perhaps it is not PC to be gruff with your campaign staff, but that is how things get done during a campaign. It is either the candidate or the campaign manager who is Commander-in-Chief SOB.
Look at how the media drool over Donald Trump, that pussycat!
No we can’t have a grumpy old man in the White House…ever…again.
You can tell those commenters who are solidly in Bernie’s camp ! Paul’s piece provided a fair assessment of the cranky crotchety old geezer from Vermont that is jousting at the Presidential Windmill Heaven knows that SevenDays has provided Sanders with more coverage than any other media outlet including their “Bernie Beat” and still this sycophants are unsatisfied. It is never a good idea to bite the friendly hand that is patting you (or your favorite candidate) gently in the head!
All things Bernie are here….. Check it out!!
http://feelthebern.org
If you’d like to know all about Bernie go here as well
http://www.berniesandersvideo.com
And it’s just as obvious to tell who in these comments hates progressives and Bernie Sanders. They kill for the chance to claim moral oneupsmanship when the entire conservative cause is based on lies and propaganda.
I object to the oversimplification that passes for a justification of this analysis in the first place:
“If he wins, he’ll become the boss of some 4.2 million federal employees, have a standing army at his disposal and, you know, hold the nuclear launch codes. So an analysis of his management style and temper might be reasonable.”
Come on, Paul. There are *no* checks and balances between the person in the Oval Office and the functions within his purview? Tell me: What kind of a boss was Lyndon Johnson. LBJ was unafraid to step on toes to pass sweeping and historic civil rights legislation. Bernie look like Mr. Rogers in contrast.
Maybe Bernie was justified in howling at staffers so gutless that, down the road, they didn’t have the character to be identified on record.
Yet if Bernie Sanders were to allow one his friends to pay below a livable wage, sell a major Vermont city to the highest bidder for the purposes of developing it, or allow those said developers to largely fund his campaign, Seven Days would praise him.
“rude, short-tempered and, occasionally, downright hostile” . . . you should meet his wife. You’d have to add mentally unstable to the list. The employees of Burlington College can tell some tales, that’s for sure.
For those who are horrified and betrayed that Seven Days would publish an article critical of Bernie, I suggest you grow a thicker hide. If Bernie starts doing well in the early primaries, the national news media is going to descend on Burlington, VT, like nothing you have ever imagined, and they are going to be looking to dig up every single piece of local dirt they can. That will include everything they can find, or think they can find, on Sanders, but also the local establishment that is associated with him. That Burlington is so openly liberal is going to make it a special target for the right-wing news media. I suspect we’re going to have a whole lot of skeletons trotted out of the closet and quite a bit of peripheral damage before the dust finally settles.
As I can attest from a number of encounters with him down through the years, Bernie is definitely not a nice human being. He reacts to differences of opinion in a loud and blustery kind of way without even pretending to listen (as other politicians do). However, we should keep the focus not on personalities but on politics and where Bernie, the “avowed socialist” has been lacking. One of the most important places where he’s been lacking or silent has been on imperialism and militarism. This past week, a petition which has been circulating on the Internet and signed by thousands of people was delivered to him asking him to do better in that regard. The BlackLivesMatter activists who confronted Bernie about that got some grudging headway. I’m not holding my breath on the other because Bernie has never been friendly to the Vermont peace community. But we’ll see.
Bernie is decidedly not warm and cuddly and often deliberately confrontational . Being on the right (in the context of Vermont) , his actions can make me furious . Having said this I’m starting to believe that 7D’s is taking the old Japanese proverb “The nail that sticks out shall be hammered down ” as its editorial stance when covering the Sanders campaign .Is he becoming too big for his britches according to you ?
Besides the above , this article has a real smarmy title .
BTW , I’m impressed by all the posts so perhaps the author is to be commended . Perhaps not .
Come on he’s from Brooklyn NY .How do you think he should act.Why has he been elected some many times if he was that bad.All the bleeding hearts of Vermont can’t and will never understand.In the words of Frank Perdue it takes a tough man to make a tender chicken.All the little cry babies should grow up.And if you can’t run with the dogs stay on the porch.
Hard to say what Heintz is up to. He might actually believe the premise of this ‘story’ and be one of those people who condenses a whole range of human expression (irritability, brusqueness, impatience, frustration, worry, fear, earnestness, passion, intensity, indignation and anger) into the serious issue of an “anger management problem”. Perhaps he thinks subjective, individualized reactions and preferences are the same as facts. Nameless ex-employees declare Sanders ‘abusive’ and horrible, therefore this is worth press attention. I would suggest that if Heintz truly wants to write a serious story about the personal side of a politician, this ain’t it. Read an excellent article by an extraordinary journalist – Michael Kelly – “A Sober Look at Ted Kennedy” to see the real deal. I actually think Heintz’s motivation for this nonsense is more mundane and more cynical. He wants “hits”. Sanders telling an NYT reporter her question about “hair” was not serious went “viral” and Heintz wants in. The sad part of all this is that the country desperately needs real journalists who respect their trade and would rather run down main street in their skivvie’s with a lampshade on their heads before they would willingly try to create a meme with no legs – the operative word here is CREATE – that could influence something as important as the presidential race. But I think that is exactly what Heintz wants to do.
“But I think that is exactly what Heintz wants to do.”
You’re totally speculating about Heintz’s motive(s) in writing this story. So you are doing exactly what you accuse Heintz of doing: playing psychologist.
According to “some who worked for him” NAMES PLEASE or you are just spreading rumors.
Great Article…
Interesting article. One question though: who’s Paul Heintz?
Bringing into question whether Bernie should have access to nuclear launch codes made this piece of “reporting” particularly entertaining. Because handing them over to Donald Trump, who demonstrated his”leadership” and “patience” on national television week after week would be significantly better?
And if the media doesn’t want to to be in the hot seat you might want to focus more on producing in depth meaningful articles then sensationalist bullshit designed to divert our attention AWAY from topics that are actually important.
I’ll vote for Bernie anyway
i’d trust bernie’s “temperment” over any republican and clinton running for this race. another spindoctored, mindless article.
Very interesting and ironic point of view for a guy who champions the impoverished
property management
I like how everyone is using their names to discuss this article and how one sided and unsubstantiated it is. Except for the one guy that is continuously trying to talk smack. Know your assumptions certainly doesn’t want us to know who they are. Like all the unnamed sources in the article, your assumptions carry little to no weight.
This article relies on another article for its information and vice versa. Its silly and in effect made me feel even stronger about supporting Bernie Sanders. So Bernie dont take crap. Isn’t that a good thing ? I find it to be a GREAT AND POSITIVE thing. This article doesnt do anything but show people that Bernie Sanders is no push over. He doesnt want to hear griping and grumbling or excuses HE WANTS TO GET THINGS DONE. Isnt this what we need? His policies are good, the way he plans to implement them are good and doable, he has the nation and its people’s best interest in mind and at heart, he’s wise, experienced, caring and has back bone. love it. Am definitely voting Bernie Sanders in the primaries and then in the general election!
Bah! Apparently none of those former ” employees” ever worked for anyone from NYC before. We make being ‘excuseless’ an art form. My old boss would scream across the room if the deli put an extra tomato on his sandwich.
.. and has anyone ever read reviews on eboss or Glassdoor? They make Bernie look like grumpy grandpa.
“Bah! Apparently none of those former ” employees” ever worked for anyone from NYC before.”
This isn’t NYC. And the issue is Bernie’s hypocrisy, not whether he’d be considered a more normal boss if he was in the private sector in NYC.
Funny how this article doesn’t mention that he is also the only one who pays his interns!!!
What a ridiculous article. Most of our elected officials in Washington spend much of their time sucking up to wealthy donors. The work and the decisions are left to underpaid 20-something staff (and unpaid interns).
Why in hell would ANYONE criticize elected public servants, paid by tax dollars, for doing the JOB that they were hired to do? “Micromanaging”? Because a US Senator doesn’t follow the lead of most of his colleagues, being wined and dined by wealthy “owners,” while allowing staff to have free reign? Obviously, this writer either has no idea how things work in DC, or has some sort of vendetta against Bernie…..maybe a both.
The anonymous complainers should seek employment in another office….plenty of senators and congress people are more than happy to rake in their salary, benefits, and “contributions,” while being MIA during “office hours.”
If this is true then it’s really disappointing and my perception of him will go into the toilet. However Sanders responded to this story with the following:
“Where did you get that information from?” Sanders asked Des Moines Register opinion editor Lynn Hicks. “You got it from one article written by one person, who quoted four anonymous people.”
Having employed hundreds of people throughout his three decades in politics, Sanders said “four anonymous people” painted an unfair picture.
“Yes, I do work hard. Yes, I do demand a lot of the people who work with me. Yes, some people have left who were not happy. But I would say that by and large in my Senate office, in my House office, on my campaigns, the vast majority of people who have worked with me considered that to be a very, very good experience, and a learning experience and have gone on to do some great things,” the Vermont senator said. “So I don’t agree with that. That is one article written by one person who is not my strongest supporter and had to dig up four anonymous sources.”
“You think we can get four anonymous sources to say that you may not be the best employer in the world?” Sanders asked Register opinion writers and editors.
Imagine the outrage that would ensue if Hillary Clinton turned out to be an abusive boss, what for now Sanders supporters call “good leader”. I rest my case
So I’m supposed to vote for Bernie or not based upon his personality instead of the issues? Because I am NEVER voting for Hillary – based upon the issues. I don’t care if he yelled at somebody.
Something was there that I couldn’t put my finger on. This was very helpful! Thank you.
Well, I’ve never read an article at SevenDaysVT before, and after this one, probably never will again. A whole article about four previous employees out of hundreds or thousands of people who have interacted with Sen Sanders are disgruntled? A few people anonymously complaining that their boss told them to stop making excuses and yelled about getting the job done?
Whew, that’s NEWS!
Your article is obviously designed to disparage this great man who millions of us support and trust. And of course the article DISTRACTS from the issues he promotes.
Good try. We’re taking our government back this year, with or without those of you who desperately try to denigrate our current leader.
I worked for him. That’s why I no longer support him. He’s a terrible person and is more concerned with piddly crap than the big picture. He’s a lot of hot air who can’t figure out what is and is not important and just shouts about whatever he thinks will reel people in.
oh, that’s adorable. you think yelling sometimes is equivalent to throwing things at staffers.
klobuchar isn’t going to happen, stop trying to make it happen.