President Donald Trump mocked strong polling news for “crazy” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) Sunday, and wondered in pretend confusion what it all means. Sanders shot back: “It means you’re going to lose.”
Trump was responding to poll results showing Sanders taking the lead among Democratic presidential candidates with Iowa voters just weeks before the state caucus. The highly regarded Des Moines Register/CNN poll found that Sanders has the support of 20% of likely Iowa Democratic caucus-goers, compared to 17% for Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), 16% for former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and 15% for former Vice President Joe Biden.
Winning the first state to hold a primary boosts the profile of a candidate and can sway future contests. Barack Obama’s former director of communications, Jennifer Palmieri, tweeted that the winner in Iowa became the nominee in the “last six cycles.”
Trump really isn’t taking Sanders as lightly as he might pretend. At an Ohio rally earlier this month, the president lashed the Vermont senator as a “wealthy, fossil fuel-guzzling millionaire” who “lectures Americans on how to live their lives while doing the exact opposite.” Trump failed to provide any details.
On a lighter note Sunday, Sanders quipped that look-alike and sound-alike actor-comedian Larry David — who has delivered dead-on impersonations of the senator on “Saturday Night Live” — will “have a good job for the next four years” if Sanders is elected president, the candidate vowed.