How would Bernie Sanders have done?

[Hammy]

AZ and GA would not have flipped. I don’t think PA or WI would have either.

Sanders had bigger draw in the Rust Belt as well as with Hispanics. I'll agree on Georgia though, but PA/WI would've had larger wins.

[TML]

He has the ability to fire up Democratic base voters. He might not have flipped AZ/GA/FL/NC, but he probably would have had a good chance of flipping IA/OH (thereby flipping WI/MI/PA in the process).

[Catalyst138]

I don’t think the map would be that different at all.

-He’d do around the same in MI/WI and slightly worse in PA (specifically Lackawanna) but it wouldn’t change the margin enough to flip it.

-He’d do a bit better in IA and ME-02 and lose TX by only 3-4% by not hemorrhaging South Texas as much

-He would still win AZ just trading a few white votes for Latino votes

-NC and OH would vote about the same

-He’d do better in NV, NH, and NM but who cares

-He’d do worse in FL but no Democrat was winning Florida this cycle, so again who cares

-Georgia is the only state that may have voted differently, but only from Biden +0.5 to Trump +0.5 or something small like that.

[For Trump, everything. For immigrants, the law]

How well he would've done depends completely on my personal opinion of him. My mind has incredible control over hypothetical situations, it's pretty amazing tbh.

Has this ever not been the case with this sort of hypotheticals here on Atlas?

Yes, my point exactly.

[Starry Eyed Jagaloon]

AZ and GA would not have flipped. I don’t think PA or WI would have either.

Sanders had bigger draw in the Rust Belt.

Primary results show that is very obviously not the case.

[AnOdyssey]

Bernie would have done as well as Biden. More well in Midwest and Rust Belt, but not as good in the sun belt.

Bernie would have done MUCH MUCH WORSE in the aftermath of the election when the red mirage faded and the blue shift came into full swing. What we are seeing now from the Trump Campaign would be intensified if Berne was the nominee and named President-Elect on the 7th.

They'd fear mongering that a "socialist" is literally trying to steal the election and overthrow the government, using any red baiting tactics they can muster, and worse, enticing violence.

The sad and scary thing is, with Bernie and the Trump camp started to invoke violent measures...Bernie might've capitulated for the good of the country despite winning fairly =/

[Protect Trans Hoosiers]

Bernie Sanders would have lost narrowly, and at this point members of The Lincoln Project would be furiously gargling Listerine after nine months of claiming a self-avowed socialist is our best choice for US President. TLP would have done it, but they wouldn't have liked it.

[wildviper121]

The only swing states Sanders did better than Biden in in the primary were Nevada and Iowa. This may be a good way of measuring things. For example, Mitt Romney won Nevada, Minnesota, and Michigan in the 2008 GOP primaries over McCain. In 2012, Romney did —disproportionately— better in Nevada, Minnesota, and Michigan. Same holds true for the upper rockies, which Romney won in 2008 and shifted greater than his national average in 2012. It’s a little more complicated than that—for example, Romney lost Minnesota’s GOP primary in 2012 and Indiana’s in 2008, though both saw large shifts from McCain to him.

States may just be swingy. But primaries are the best measurement of comparative strength. In OTL, Biden won the primaries in key states he lost in the general election. It’s hard to believe the loser of these states would have done better.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

https://twitter.com/KyleKulinski/status/1324735367610798081

lol cuck cucklinski

[BudgieForce]

I think Bernie could have won. His path would be entirely through the midwest with very little room for error though. I can't imagine him flipping anything in the sunbelt, although he probably does better in Texas than Biden.

[DaleCooper]

https://twitter.com/KyleKulinski/status/1324735367610798081

lol cuck cucklinski

Kulinski is easily one of the most delusional people in media outside of the rightwing propaganda machine. He's also woefully uninformed about everything he talks about.

[Lemmiwinks]

I think Bernie comes up just short. I don’t see how he flips GA or AZ, and I doubt he flips PA either. In fairness to Bernie, I think just about all of the potential nominees would have come up short. In hindsight, it does seem Biden was the only one who could have pulled it off.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

This vindicates Bernie, Bernie would have indeed won in 2016, due to the fact he had Biden appeal to swing voters And the Comey letter did in fact cost Hillary the trio of Midwestern states. Hillary was damaged goods in 2016 due to Benghazi

All polls showed Bernie doing better in MI,PA and WI that cost Hillary the election. We would he talking about 3 D SCOTUS vacancies than Crt Packing which will happen in 2023 , just not in 2021 after D's net WI, PA and NC Senate races after 2022

[Intell]

While Bernie 2016 campaign certainly would've won and done better than Biden, Bernie 2020 campaign would've made the election closer than Biden did. I think you see NE-2 flipping, and WI, MI and PA being nail-biters. I think Sanders wins the popular vote by 3 points.

[Badger]

A similar map. Maybe Bernie loses AZ or wins NC or ME-02. But really pretty similar. He does better in the rust belt, making the states Biden won there more secure but doesn't win any additional states there.

No. Just no.

[King of Kensington]

The Sanders path, presumably, assumes that he does better with (and turns out more) "WWC" and Hispanic voters and the African American turnout is at least as good as Biden's?

[H. Ross Peron]

Worse. Much worse. Given we know how effective trying to tie Biden to 'socialism', BLM etc, Sanders would have lost by a few percentage points.

Hysterical doomerism. Given polarization trends and the fact that Miami-Dade swung so much even with Biden as the nominee suggests that socialism rhetoric only seriously affects a small share of voters (mostly Cubans, Venezuelans, and Vietnamese, all of whom incidentally shifted to Trump this cycle). Bernie probably matches Biden's numbers in the popular vote but with slightly different coalitions. He keeps the Rust Belt trio and Arizona. Sanders would lose Florida by a somewhat larger margin but that's meaningless. The only difference conceivably would be Georgia.

[Brittain33]

AZ and GA would not have flipped. I don’t think PA or WI would have either.

Sanders had bigger draw in the Rust Belt as well as with Hispanics. I'll agree on Georgia though, but PA/WI would've had larger wins.

People talk about Sanders doing well with Hispanics but his win in Nevada involved only 40,000 actual Hispanic voters in a state with strong unions already. There was never evidence that he was pulling in large numbers and I seriously doubt he would have done better in places like the RGV.

[Brittain33]

He has the ability to fire up Democratic base voters. He might not have flipped AZ/GA/FL/NC, but he probably would have had a good chance of flipping IA/OH (thereby flipping WI/MI/PA in the process).

He hasn’t demonstrated the ability to fire up Democratic base voters, and turnout ended at historic levels without him. I am very skeptical he would have made IA or OH closer, and the margin in those states was so huge he had no chance of flipping them.

[Brittain33]

https://twitter.com/KyleKulinski/status/1324735367610798081

lol cuck cucklinski

Maybe over two elections.

[Brittain33]

Worse. Much worse. Given we know how effective trying to tie Biden to 'socialism', BLM etc, Sanders would have lost by a few percentage points.

Hysterical doomerism. Given polarization trends and the fact that Miami-Dade swung so much even with Biden as the nominee suggests that socialism rhetoric only seriously affects a small share of voters (mostly Cubans, Venezuelans, and Vietnamese, all of whom incidentally shifted to Trump this cycle). Bernie probably matches Biden's numbers in the popular vote but with slightly different coalitions. He keeps the Rust Belt trio and Arizona. Sanders would lose Florida by a somewhat larger margin but that's meaningless. The only difference conceivably would be Georgia.

Under no circumstances does Sanders win Arizona. We needed a lot of affluent suburban Rs to cross over to eke out a small victory.

[Lord Halifax]

Worse. Much worse. Given we know how effective trying to tie Biden to 'socialism', BLM etc, Sanders would have lost by a few percentage points.

Hysterical doomerism. Given polarization trends and the fact that Miami-Dade swung so much even with Biden as the nominee suggests that socialism rhetoric only seriously affects a small share of voters (mostly Cubans, Venezuelans, and Vietnamese, all of whom incidentally shifted to Trump this cycle). Bernie probably matches Biden's numbers in the popular vote but with slightly different coalitions. He keeps the Rust Belt trio and Arizona. Sanders would lose Florida by a somewhat larger margin but that's meaningless. The only difference conceivably would be Georgia.

Under no circumstances does Sanders win Arizona. We needed a lot of affluent suburban Rs to cross over to eke out a small victory.

Not with Sanders' higher level of support among Hispanics. It would have been a different coalition, but the result would likely have been roughly the same.

[Brittain33]

Worse. Much worse. Given we know how effective trying to tie Biden to 'socialism', BLM etc, Sanders would have lost by a few percentage points.

Hysterical doomerism. Given polarization trends and the fact that Miami-Dade swung so much even with Biden as the nominee suggests that socialism rhetoric only seriously affects a small share of voters (mostly Cubans, Venezuelans, and Vietnamese, all of whom incidentally shifted to Trump this cycle). Bernie probably matches Biden's numbers in the popular vote but with slightly different coalitions. He keeps the Rust Belt trio and Arizona. Sanders would lose Florida by a somewhat larger margin but that's meaningless. The only difference conceivably would be Georgia.

Under no circumstances does Sanders win Arizona. We needed a lot of affluent suburban Rs to cross over to eke out a small victory.

Not with Sanders' higher level of support among Hispanics. It would have been a different coalition, but the result would likely have been roughly the same.

There’s no evidence Sanders actually gets higher support from Hispanics. He did relatively well among some Hispanics who voted in Democratic primaries, but that’s a small fraction of the total and relates to primaries only. Hispanic turnout was up without him anyway. Arizona had active grassroots organizing in place and they turned out for Biden / against Trump.

[Mr. Smith]

Better in the popular vote [probably similar in the college], because the man had a message besides "Will you shut up man".

Of course, a timeline Sanders wins in would likely be one without COVID, and therefore more dependent on an actual campaign.

Imagine 1980, if instead of Reagan,  GHW Bush or Larry Pressler were the nominee against Carter and Carter tried the same "will take your healthcare away" message.

It's like that.

More importantly, the grassroots could've created a downballot sort of effect. Ramirez (TX) and Smith (NC) would've drawn more attention, and Gideon (ME) wouldn't have been taken for granted.

[7,052,770]

Probably would have lost, but not in a landslide. There is a very strong anti-Trump sentiment in America that would have backed any nominee.