Nowhere in that article does it say that potential Hillary voters were so smitten by Sanders, that they flipped completely to the opposite ideology and voted for Trump, when it was confirmed that Sanders had lost the primary. That article states 12% of Sanders supporters voted for Trump. Enough to sway the election even. But what that article fails to inform us is that those 12% of Sanders supporters were those who would NEVER have voted for Hillary at any rate. 78% DID vote for Hillary. It makes sense to me that probably around 12% of them were of the Independent variety that were only drawn to Sanders and Trump's common narrative because "they both carried an outsider message and appealed to voters frustrated with the staid political establishment".
And of that 12%, as the article states: "Another factor, however, was that of those who switched their allegiance from Sanders to Trump less than 10 percent considered themselves strong Democrat". So that reduces the number to less than 1.2% of true blue Democrats-for-Sanders flipped.
But the common aspect of all of that 12%, even that 1.2%, is that they were probably already brainwashed, along with others more deplorable, by RW media, by decades of fake news and CT rubbish about the Clintons, that they were NEVER going to vote for her anyways. So she did NOT lose votes because of Sanders. Sanders voters came not just from the rank and file Democrat delegates, but also from the growing segment of Americans, perhaps even with no clear political party preference, that were fed up with the status quo + were susceptible to the relentless fake news about Hillary that was pounded into them on a daily basis from RW radio, Fox News, and Russian/GOP social media propaganda, and on the far left to a smaller degree the Sarandon faction. But the common factor is Hillary never had their votes to begin with!
So you can complain all you want about them not voting for Hillary. But no amount of complaining to them would have made them NOT vote Trump.
Yet on DU at times, I see this false rationalization that if only Sanders had not poisoned the well, so to speak, ALL of those, all 100% of them, (instead of only 78%) would have been strong Hillary votes. It just does not compute, sorry.
But what this article DOES confirm once again, is that Sanders would have likely won. That the Democratic party would have received that 12% extra with Sanders as the candidate. (And if that article is right that that 12% would have made a deciding difference)
Not from die hard Democrats, but from mostly Independents, small r Republicans, or anti-establishment fanatics. But a vote is a vote. Minus of course any radical PUMA Hillary supporters that would refuse to vote Democratic because Sanders had won the primary.....but I'd hope the vast majority would've supported the Democratic party nominee right?
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