Sanders Wins ExPat Vote but Too Little Too Late

Following a long series of primary losses to Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders earned a decisive 58 to 23% win in the “Ex-Pat Primary,” the contest that measures the candidates’ strength among Americans who live abroad. The race itself appears to be a pyrrhic victory for Sanders with a mere 9 delegates going to the Vermont senator’s column at a time when he trails Biden by more than 200 delegates. But the contest does provide indicators that will be useful to the standard bearer in the general election. In the Israel vote, the two candidates finished with Sanders winning by a mere 2 percentage points – within the margin of error – thus providing further indication that assuming a negative posture toward Israel is no longer a dangerous political move. Sanders has arguably taken the lead in issuing stinging rebukes against Prime Minister Netanyahu and Israeli government while embracing the most aggressively anti-Israel faces in the Democratic Party. Young voters between 18 and 44 have not abandoned Sanders nor, presumably, his tough stance on Israel.