WASHINGTON — With his prospects of becoming the Democratic nominee for president fading, Bernie Sanders is pushing hard for what he thinks is the next best thing: the party platform.
It’s a document of policy positions and goals few are likely to read and the White House will barely notice. But Sanders hopes it will enable him to put his imprint on the broader party brand and influence what it stands for beyond Election Day.
He wants it to include “Medicare for all,” free tuition at public colleges and universities, aggressive efforts to ease income inequality and end the role of big money in political campaigns. Likely nominee Hillary Clinton won’t necessarily go along, and will find Sanders and his passionate supporters ready to fight.
“Bernie doesn’t want to be secretary of state. Bernie wants to lead a movement,” said Roger Hickey, co-director of Campaign for America’s Future, a liberal group sympathetic to the Vermont senator.
With 2,205 delegates toward the 2,383 needed for nomination, Clinton is virtually assured of nomination. Yet Sanders is favored in at least four of the remaining nine primaries, positioning him to add to his 1,401 delegates.
The more delegates, the stronger his voice in platform matters. “Rallying around the nominee is the most obvious point of unity, but (the platform) is also providing some accommodation and some unity around issues,” said Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., who in October was the first member of Congress to endorse Sanders.
Clinton has already embraced some of the Sanders camp’s views, notably opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact. She had backed the deal while secretary of state.
But her supporters are likely to dominate the platform committee, making it difficult for Sanders to win full acceptance of most of his other big goals.
The Sanders team insists there’s value to a platform fight.
“We care a lot about the platform. It defines what it means to be a Democrat,” explained Larry Cohen, senior adviser to the Sanders campaign.
The themes are capsulized on the “Bernie Ballot” given to voters by National Nurses United, a union backing Sanders. The ballot has 10 points, including “security for veterans,” “end racism” and “money out of politics.”
Trouble is, Clinton backs similar themes. Sanders forces say they are more forceful, more specific. It’s not just enough to oppose the trade plan. “We want to tell the president not to send it to Congress. He’ll ruin his legacy and deeply divide the party,” Cohen said.
The Clinton campaign did not respond to requests for comment. Gov. Dannel Malloy of Connecticut and former Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin, both of them Clinton allies, will co-chair the committee.
Leigh Appleby, Connecticut Democratic Party spokesman, said Malloy is “confident the platform committee will come together.”
Among the most intense battles could be health care policy. Sanders wants a universal health care system. Clinton prefers incremental changes to current law.
“We’ve made large strides with the Affordable Care Act,” said Hickey. But as insurance premiums rise, he maintained, many lower-income consumers will have difficulty affording policies.
The challenge for the Clinton team is to prevent the Sanders effort from erupting into a full-blown battle that will steal national attention from its candidate and her carefully honed messages. While the 187-member platform committee is likely to be dominated by Clinton loyalists, it only takes one-fourth of the members to offer a minority report that the full convention would consider.
Sanders is already crying foul. Friday, he called Malloy an “aggressive attack surrogate” for Clinton. In a letter to Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Democratic Party chairman, Sanders charged that his recommendations for committee slots are being largely ignored.
“If the process is set up to produce an unfair, one-sided result,” he wrote, “we are prepared to mobilize our delegates to force as many votes as necessary to amend the platform and rules on the floor of the convention.”
Luis Miranda, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee, insisted the party is using “an open, inclusive and representative process.” He said both campaigns will be represented on committee.
Platform combat used to be almost routine at Democratic conventions. The party split so bitterly over civil rights in 1948 that Southerners left and ran their own candidate for president. Twenty years later, the party was ripped apart by supporters and opponents of the Vietnam War.
The most recent intense platform fight came at 1988’s Democratic convention when supporters of Jesse Jackson sought planks involving nuclear strategy, taxation and national health coverage.
At the same time, the Sanders forces don’t want to hurt Clinton so badly they make likely Republican nominee Donald Trump’s path to victory easier.
“We’ll support the Democratic nominee,” Cohen said, but they’re also looking at the party and the years ahead.
“We’re a movement,” Cohen said, “not a moment.”
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