This isn't about Bernie Bros. It's about whether bitter moderates will vote for Sanders when they don't get their way

I was glad to speak out against the 'Bernie or Bust' movement in 2016. Now I want the same from Biden and Buttigieg supporters who might not get their chosen candidate in November

Since announcing his second bid for the presidency nearly a year ago, Sanders has consistently remained a top-tier candidate in polling numbers, has repeatedly attracted large crowds at his events, and notably, has raised gargantuan sums of money from small donations — besting all the competition. Yet, for much of the 2020 presidential race, Sanders’ campaign has been treated by many in the media like an afterthought.

In the middle of February, however, Bernie Sanders has won the second-most votes in a chaotic caucus whose legitimacy will forever be in question and won the first primary of the race — the latter of which exceeded 2008’s level of participation. It's worth noting that in Iowa, the Sanders campaign contends it won the popular vote as well.

Unfortunately, when I turned on cable news, all I kept hearing about was how awesome it was for Amy Klobuchar to make it to third place (but not so great for Elizabeth Warren a week ago, mind you) while adding that second place is super cool, too. As for first, apparently, the Sanders campaign should still feel bad that the turnout in Iowa was low (although youth participation, a Sanders campaign bragging right, was up) and downright awful for not winning New Hampshire with as high a percentage as he did in 2016 when he was running against just one person.

Whether you like it or not, however — and lots of commentators have made it clear that they do not — Bernie Sanders now has far more of a plausible path to the nomination than most candidates left in the race.

What about Mayor Pete, I hear you cry? Well, I know white cable pundits keep trying to make fetch happen with Pete Buttigieg, but he still acts like he didn’t start really interacting with black people until he caught a matinée of Get Out two years ago, and while it is clear he is chasing the cadence of former President Obama, soon black voters will remind him that he could never… and will never. The same can be said of Klobuchar, who keeps talking about her ability to unite, but, much like Buttigieg, is too little, too late on remembering black people have a say in this process, too. Based on Klobuchar’s exchange with fellow former prosecutor Sunny Hostin about her controversial background as a prosecutor on The View, it won’t get any better for her.

I’m lifting Elizabeth Warren for president in prayer and I’m sure someone is saying a rosary on behalf of Joe Biden’s stalling bid, but you know, it’s not looking good. Oh, Michael Bloomberg, another moderate fantasy: money can only go so far, and I doubt he can fix stop and frisk before his campaign is f...foiled, we’ll go with foiled.

So let’s talk about what happens if and when Sanders does get the nomination. And this conversation starts with a tweet by David Axelrod:

Axelrod is far from the first to caution Sanders supporters to vote for the nominee, whomever he or she is. It is in response to the “Bernie or Bust” days of yore, when some Sanders supporters in 2016 said they would only vote Democrat if Bernie was the candidate. Indeed, many claimed they would vote for Donald Trump over Hillary, if it came to it. And it seems that a few of them did.

In 2016, I wrote an essay called "Bernie Sanders or bust? That's a stance based on privilege" that got me some very obnoxious, often bigoted emails for a long time. In sum, I said the idea that it doesn’t matter if Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump won because they are one and the same was a mighty white response not rooted in reality, because for a lot of people, who wins does mean a great deal.

See: marginalized people living in hell under Donald Trump.

“Bernie or Bust” was a selfish choice in my opinion, but at this point, isn’t it about time we also started asking people who aren’t Bernie supporters to back him if he is the nominee? You know, as opposed to pretending he hasn’t been building a multicultural coalition; hasn’t been raising lots of money; hasn’t got high favorables; isn’t actually winning.

As of this week, there are people still arguing about the dangers of Bernie or Bust — but that is the wrong argument to be having. Simple facts tell us we need to be having the same conversation, not with angry progressives, but with potentially bitter moderates when their chosen candidate falls by the wayside. When Pete Buttigieg doesn’t make fetch happen.

The race has not been settled. So many things can happen. But it is unfair to Bernie Sanders and his supporters to consistently lecture them on the importance of supporting the nominee when it seems they are not willing to offer the same level of consideration.

As Bernie and his supporters were once told — including by the likes of me — the numbers eventually become what they become, and if your interest is in defeating a demagogue before he brings further ruin, you will suck it up and do what needs to be done. These things were true for progressives in 2016 — and they are true for moderates now.