Bernie Sanders Continues To Refuse To Help The DNC

Senator Bernie Sanders and his supporters clearly don’t forgive a slight. The growing Democratic civil war has been fueled in part by their desire to get revenge on an establishment they view as having improperly helped Hillary Clinton last year. One of the clearest examples that all has not been forgiven by Sanders is his continued refusal to give over his extremely lucrative email list.

That email list helped Sanders raise $218 million during his presidential race, and the Democratic Party is eager to get ahold of it:

“As the Democratic Party struggles to regain its footing following its disastrous November election, one vestige of the 2016 campaign has taken on much importance: Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ email list. Sanders, who raised $218 million online from a record 2.8 million donors, rewrote the rules of email fundraising during his campaign by relentlessly courting small-dollar contributors. For many of those donors, Sanders was the first Democratic presidential candidate they had supported—or the first politician they had ever helped.”

Unfortunately for them, Sanders and his closest advisers show no signs of giving it over to the DNC. Sanders’ campaign manager Jeff Weaver, who controls the list through Sanders’ new political group, has categorically ruled out giving over the list:

“Democrats have made no secret they covet Sanders’ list, which Sanders controls through his Senate campaign and the political nonprofit he founded, Our Revolution. The decision on what to do with it rests with Sanders. ‘Our Revolution won’t be giving over the list,’ says the group’s president, Jeff Weaver, who was Sanders’ presidential campaign manager.”

At the same time, Michael Briggs, Sanders’ spokesman, has denied that Sanders has even discussed sharing his email list with the Democratic establishment. Sanders and his team clearly still hold a grudge from 2016. If that’s the case, the Democratic Party will not be able to move past its harmful divisions.