The Math of #BernieOrBust
Sanders supporters warned from the beginning that they were #BernieOrBust. It was a clear declaration of their resolve to not vote for Hillary under any circumstances. Whatever your opinion of the Bernie Or Bust coalition, there was no such thing as a #HillaryOrBust movement.
While there was no way to measure the actual number of Bernie Or Bust voters, published estimates suggested that half of the 14 million people that voted for Sanders in the Primary were unflinchingly Bernie Or Bust.
Thats more than 7 million people that we know of based on votes in the Primaries, and with a little math we can scale that to the General election which tells us that 115.92% more votes were cast in the General than in the Primaries.
31,821,265 Dem + 31,391,854 GOP = 63,213,119 Total votes in Primaries
136,489,372 Total votes in General (as of 1/15/2017)
136,489,372 General - 63,213,119 Primaries = 73,276,253 more votes in General than in Primaries
73,276,253 ÷ 63,213,119 = 1.1592 x 100 = 115.9193% RND = 115.92% increase of votes in the General over the Primaries
We know that Sanders had 14,002,141 votes in the Primaries, half of which is 7,001,071 Bernie Or Bust devotees. At a 115.92% increase of voters in the General, we can safely estimate that the Bernie Or Bust movement was more than 15 million voters strong.
14,002,141 Sanders voters in Primaries÷ 2 = 7,001,071 Bernie Or Bust Primary voters
7,001,071 Bernie Or Bust Primary voters x 115.92% = 8,115,641.5032 RND = 8,115,642 more Bernie Or Bust devotees in the General over the Primaries
7,001,071 Bernie Or Bust Primary voters + 8,115,642 more Bernie Or Bust devotees in the General = 15,116,713 Total Bernie Or Bust voters in the General election
15,116,713 Total Bernie Or Bust voters ÷ 136,489,372 Total votes in General = 0.1108 x 100 = 11.075377356% RND = 11% of voters in General were Bernie Or Bust
15,116,713 Total Bernie Or Bust voters + 65,844,610 Total Hillary Clinton votes in General = 80,961,323 potential Democratic votes in General
15,116,713 Total Bernie Or Bust voters ÷ 80,961,323 potential Democratic votes in General = 0.186715242 x 100 = 18.67152418% RND = 18.67% of potential Democratic votes lost by running Hillary Clinton in General
When the total number of votes in the General election are 136,489,372, no candidate can afford to lose 15,116,713 voters. Thats 11% of all votes cast.
More significantly, by running Hillary Clinton in the General election, a loss of 15,116,713 potential voters is a devastating 18.67% loss of potential Democratic votes in the General. Running Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee instead of Bernie Sanders cost the Democrats nearly 20% of possible votes.
Running Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee instead of Bernie Sanders cost the Democrats nearly 20% of possible votes.
The next time more than 15 million highly engaged voters declare that they will not under any circumstances vote for a particular candidate of your party, perhaps you should listen and vote for the other candidate.
I can promise you this, and mark my words — Progressive Berniecrats are just getting started. From now on, its #ProgressiveOrBust whether you like it or not. Get on board now because by 2020 there will be 20 or 30 million Progressives screaming Progressive Or Bust, and you damn well better vote their way because they are forever done with NeoLiberalism.
— Antyal
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You can find Antyal Tennyson on Twitter under the handle @AntyalT.
