Dana Mathewson

Communist candidate for President Bernie Sanders first negotiates a union contract to pay his campaign staffers, then screws them. Does that say anything about the way things would be in his "socialist paradise?"

Democrat presidential candidate Bernie Sanders announced this weekend he will cut staffers' hours so that they can effectively be paid a $15-an-hour minimum wage, prompting mockery from critics who say the move is more evidence that Sanders' plan to raise the national minimum wage is hypocritical and would only lead to less work and more unemployment.

The Washington Post first reported last Thursday that Sanders' field staffers were upset that Sanders championed a $15 minimum wage on the campaign trail, and made headlines for railing against major corporations who pay "starvation wages" -- even as his own employees made "poverty wages."

In response, Sanders told The Des Moines Register he was "very proud" to lead the first major presidential campaign with unionized workers, but also "bothered" that news of the internal strife had spilled into the media.

The self-described socialist candidate said junior field organizers earn roughly $36,000 per year in salary, with employer-paid health care and sick leave. But he acknowledged that their salary can effectively dip below $15 per hour if staffers work much more than 40 hours per week, which is common on presidential campaigns.

The solution is to "limit the number of hours staffers work to 42 or 43 each week to ensure they’re making the equivalent of $15 an hour," he told the Register's Brianne Pfannenstiel.

[...]

"It does bother me that people are going outside of the process and going to the media," Sanders added. "That is really not acceptable. It is really not what labor negotiations are about, and it's improper."

He went on to say that the union contract "not only provides pay of at least $15 an hour, it also provides, I think, the best health care benefits that any employer can provide for our field organizers."

Reaction from commentators and lawmakers was unsparing.

"For the first time in his life, socialist Bernie Sanders practices economics and, buddy, the results are hilarious," wrote columnist and humorist Stephen Miller. He added: "Why won’t millionaire Bernie Sanders, who owns 3 homes, instead of cutting hours, pay his staff a living wage? People are starving."

Bernie screws his staff out of union-contracted pay, they go to the press to complain, and he's upset. One wonders why. Gee, it's an unjust world! Bernie, why don't you just drop this presidential campaign, climb up into the balcony with Statler and Waldorf and just heckel Fozzy Bear?

It's a great article, and although I couldn't do a good job of embedding the Tweet, you can go here https://www.foxnews.com/politics/bernie-sanders-campaign-announces-it-will-cut-hours-to-pay-staffers-15-minimum-wage-prompting-mockery  to the article and see it, and the rest of the article too. Please do!

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