How Bernie Sanders will help Donald Trump

The final results of the latest primaries in the United States were summarized. On Tuesday, Republicans had Primaries in Nebraska and West Virginia, and Democrats voted for their candidates only in the Mountain State. Trump’s victory in West Virginia was predicted long before. The Appalachian state with a ruined economy and the lowest quality of life in the US practically unanimously supported Trump as a chance for an alternative. 77% of the West Virginians voted for Trump. After Gov. Kasich and Sen. Cruz dropped out the race, Trump winning in Nebraska also became a more technical task. He won 65% and is ready to continue his triumphant run for the republican nomination.

Undemocratic Democrats

The most interesting issue in the American presidential race today is the future Democratic nomination. Before the primaries in West Virginia, Sanders won 19 contests, while Clinton won 26. Now the backlog is rapidly reducing. Hillary now has 42% of pledged delegates, while Sanders has 35%. However, Clinton already secured her nomination because of the unpledged Super-delegates. They are 715 from a total of 4,051 Democratic delegates and 70% of them back Clinton, while only 6% dared to support Trump. They are not elected, and this system has nothing in common with democracy at all, but it is they who serve as a mechanism to secure the position of the Democratic establishment. The problem is that this system, which tactically secures the presidential nomination for Hillary, is working strategically against her and will lead to the rise of Trump's support in November 2016.

The contribution of the Super-delegates in the Democratic campaign is very important if Hillary is to win the nomination, even in the event that Bernie will win all the states contested in May-July. If this were to happen, Republican candidates will have a good pretext to blame the democrats for the lack of democracy. Trump will secure the nomination because of the will of the people, and Hillary - because of the will of the establishment. Thus, every victory for Sanders will play into the hands of Trump, damaging the public image of Clinton as an imminent Democratic candidate.

Trump-Sanders similarities

The race is very close in every state, which shows that Bernie's agenda on social and economic issues is popular among Democrat voters. It includes higher taxes on the wealthy, protectionism, criticism of international trade deals damaging the interests of American workers, and preserving the social security system. The main differences between Sanders and Hillary are in the most crucial issues, where foreign and domestic politics merge like trade deals, which leads to the deindustrialization of the US and international politics, paid for by billions of dollars and thousands of lives, which affects every American. While Hillary has changed her rhetoric on some social issues, by partially adopting Bernie's platform, she has no elaborated plans to fulfill it unlike the Vermont Senator. As it does not promise anything specific, she is not going to fulfill anything. This is why the main base of her support is minorities and women. The first vote for her will be because of her stance on immigration and deals like NAFTA. The choice of the latter is a more emotional reason than a rational one.

Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders: common points:

• Higher taxes on the wealthy
• Protectionism, rejection of globalism
• Non-interventionist foreign policy
• Anti-plutocracy stance

While Trump and Sanders strongly disagree on issues of immigration, abortions, sodomites' unions, and taxes (except the issues of taxes for the wealthy), issues that affect the economic security of working families are similarly tackled. Both candidates also reject the costly and ineffective interventionist foreign policy of Washington. In general, both candidates reflect the anger of ordinary Americans towards the political system and political class. So it is not difficult to guess who the core of Bernie's electorate will vote for if they have to choose between Clinton and Trump. If we subtract sodomites, leftist students, and ethnic minorities from Sanders supporters, the remaining normal Americans are likely to vote for Trump. His social conservatism and American nationalism is not aimed against them.

Sanders voters to vote for Trump?

A recent survey in West Virginia showed that 39% of Sanders voters would vote for Trump in the fall. The majority of Democrats in this poor Appalachian state are representatives of the white working class, so their opinion is more representative of this group among all Democrat voters.

According to nation-wide opinion polls on this issue held in March, 7-8% of Bernie’s supporters prefer Trump to Clinton, but polls in West Virginia demonstrate that things are changing. In March, The Guardian sought out Sanders fans, and of the 700 people who replied to the call-out, 500 of them said they would vote for Trump if Clinton wins the nomination. The main reasons declared were: "shared commitment for protecting workers and against

new wars", and "their zeal for an alternative to the establishment". According to April's McClatchy-Marist poll, 25% of Sanders voters will not support Clinton.
Thus, Clinton’s nomination will split the Democratic Party's electorate, attracting those who are dissatisfied with the establishment and Bernie voters to Trump's camp. Today, liberal experts unanimously reject such a perspective, but they underestimated Trump from the very beginning.

The majority of Sanders voters (except homosexuals and liberal hipsters) are not voting for personal reasons, but because he is an alternative. Thus, even if Sanders urges them to endorse Clinton, a great part are unlikely to do it, and near the date of the general elections they will switch to Trump.

At the same time the Republican leadership wants to consolidate its electorate urging other candidates and their supporters to endorse Donald Trump. If their efforts are successful, united Republicans will easily defeat divided Democrats, after all, Trump's challengers quit the race, and the Republicans have more time to resolve the main problems of battling the Democrats.

Trump Democrats can repeat the phenomenon of “Reagan’s Democrats” - traditional supporters of the Democratic Party who played a decisive role in Ronald Reagan’s victory in 1980 and 1984. Like Reagan, Trump is supported by blue collar white social conservative Democrats. Rasmussen Reports notes: "While Clinton has sizable leads over Trump among black and other minority voters, these voters are also more likely than whites to say they will stay home or vote for someone else. Trump leads among white voters ". Hillary’s minority stake may not be justified, and then the fate of America will be decided by white workers.

The only alternative

Of course Trump has his own problems - he and Hillary are at the same time the most popular and most unpopular candidates. They are leading their races, but have high negative ratings. But contrary to Clinton, Trump is going to be only anti-establishment candidate, and winning the Republican nomination will show that he imposed himself on the Republican establishment. Thus, physiologically he will attract all dissatisfied voters, and anti-Hillary voting will also play a major role. Bernie Sanders awoke a part of the dissatisfied American population that was not targeted by Trump's message. These people felt the taste of political struggle, and felt that their vote can change something. And they do not want to meekly surrender to Hillary Clinton and give her their vote. When it becomes a question of the fate of the country, many of them support Trump as the only force that can make a change.

Trump may annoy many due to his tactlessness and strange statements, but anti-Hillary sentiment is based on more solid ground: all the mistakes of her husband and Obama, plus her hawkish and disgraceful record as State Secretary (Benghazi, classified emails on private server, Syria) is working against her. When the time comes to choose between rudeness and pure evil, many will choose rudeness.