As of today, it has been widely reported that Senator Bernie Sanders has given up his bid to become the Democratic nominee. An approximate count of the Vermont senator's total pledged delegates is 1,900. Hillary Clinton has received over 2,000. However, despite the former Secretary of State's declaration of victory in achieving enough delegates to clinch the nomination, Sanders remains in the fight.
In his recent speeches, Senator Sanders continuously informs his supporters that "the struggle continues." That struggle, indeed, is the political revolution that has been at the heart of the Sanders campaign. Sure, Sanders himself stated that the current circumstances seem to indicate that he may not be the nominee, but in his words: "Elections come and go, but political revolutions continue."
I believe Sanders has aroused a vast majority of Americans with his words on economic, social, racial, and environmental justice. As pointed out in many of his rallies during the primary season, Sanders has consistently won the majority of young voters; and by young, the senator means those who are 45 and younger. This strongly indicates that the ideas brought forth by Bernie's campaign is, in fact, the ideas of the future of America. In other words, they as a collective represent the direction in which America will go.
Since the beginning of his campaign, Bernie Sanders has pushed for a movement that would "shake up the establishment," a movement involving countless individuals who are standing up for the sake of creating a country that defines themselves and not "big money interests" and corporate greed.
From talking about raising the minimum wage to $15/hour, to addressing climate change, to improving our relationship with the Native American communities all over the country, to addressing the issues on deportation, pay equity for women, ending fracking, and free tuition for public colleges and universities, Bernie has pointed out that his campaign was one, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, "of the people, by the people, and for the people."
To this day, Sanders has said that a goal of his campaign is to bring people, regardless of religion, gender identity, or color, together. In his recent speeches in New York state, the senator brought up the significance of the Civil Rights Movement, the Women's Movement, and the LGBTQ Movement. This main point, one that he has consistently highlighted in his rally speeches, deals with the idea that when people come together, change is more than possible. Change, in Sanders' words, "does not come from the top on down; it always comes from the bottom on up."
So where does Senator Sanders' campaign go from here? Here's a quick answer: He is not dropping out of the race for the Democratic nomination. Indeed, Sanders plans to go to the Democratic convention in July, with the hope and expectation that the plan to come out of the convention will be the most progressive plan ever in the party's history. Regardless of whether Bernie becomes the nominee or not, it is impossible to argue against this one truth: his political revolution will never be forgotten. With Bernie Sanders' campaign as the huge beginning, there is no doubt that the time will soon come where we truly "create a government that works for all of us, not just the one percent."
