Democratic presidential hopefuls Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg plan NC visits
Sen. Bernie Sanders will be the third Democratic presidential candidate to attend services at Greenleaf Christian Church in Goldsboro when he stops by Wednesday ahead of the March 3 primary.
Sanders, a frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, is one of three Democratic hopefuls, including former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, scheduled to visit North Carolina this week. The visits come as national attention turns to the 14 Super Tuesday states, including North Carolina, where voters will cast their primary ballots March 3.
Sanders will attend an Interfaith Ash Wednesday service led by the Rev. William J. Barber II. The doors will open to the general public at 6 p.m. Wednesday.
Klobuchar will make her first stop in North Carolina on Feb. 27 at a town hall event in Raleigh, and Buttigieg will visit Raleigh on March 1, where he will participate in a GOTV rally. The location will be announced, a spokeswoman said.
Sanders previously visited the state on Feb. 14, when he made campaign stops in Durham and Charlotte. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg visited Raleigh, Greensboro and Winston-Salem that same week.
A Washington Post-ABC News poll released Feb. 19 showed Sanders with 32% support among Democratic-leaning registered voters across the nation, followed by former Vice President Joe Biden with 16%. Bloomberg was in third place, with 14% of the vote, while Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren wasn’t far behind with 12%. Buttigieg and Klobuchar were trailing the pack.
Warren stopped in Raleigh during a November visit to North Carolina. Biden campaigned in Durham in October.
Addressing poverty, systemic racism
Barber invited the major presidential candidates from both parties last year to attend his church for a conversation about poverty.
He is president of Repairers of the Breach and co-chair of the nonpartisan Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, which is demanding a Democratic debate focused only on poverty. The Poor People’s Campaign launched the Moral Monday movement in North Carolina.
“It is exactly right to begin this season of Lent, a season of repentance, with a presidential forum focused on poverty,” Barber said in a news release announcing Sanders’ visit. “Our nation must repent for how we have ignored and refused to address the reality of 140 million people living in poverty and low wealth in this nation.”
In December, Barber’s church hosted Buttigieg, followed by Democratic candidate Tom Steyer in January. Steyer also visited the Triangle, including Durham, where he talked about housing conditions at the McDougald Terrace public housing complex, where residents have been evacuated.
Both men talked about poverty and systemic racism with Barber and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, with the Poor People’s Campaign, before answering questions from people affected by those issues. They also agreed to participate in a televised debate about poverty.
Poor People’s Campaign
Church officials, in the news release, noted that the presidential campaign events should not be taken as an endorsement or support for any candidate.
“We are not hosting Sen. Sanders to offer an endorsement,” Wilson-Hartgrove said. “We are asking Sen. Sanders and all candidates for public office to explain to the 43% of Americans who are poor and low wealth how their campaigns will address our demands.”
According to the U.S. Census, that includes roughly 1.6 million people living in poverty in North Carolina, defined as a family of four earning $24,600 or less a year.
The Poor People’s Campaign is in the midst of a national “We Must Do M.O.R.E.” tour aimed at “Mobilizing, Organizing, Registering and Educating people for a movement that votes.” The tour will culminate June 20 in a Mass Poor People’s Assembly and Moral March on Washington.
Next week, the tour will visit Alabama ahead of the Super Tuesday primaries and mark the 55th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, when several hundred civil rights marchers were stopped and beaten by local and state police on March 7, 1965, at the Edmund Pettus Bridge near Selma.
What’s next
Democratic presidential candidate and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders will visit Greenleaf Christian Church, 2110 N. William St. in Goldsboro, on Wednesday.
The doors will open to the public for the Interfaith Ash Wednesday service at 6 p.m. A forum on poverty and systemic racism will follow.
Editor’s note: The story has been corrected to reflect that Democratic candidate Pete Buttigieg is the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana.
This story was originally published February 22, 2020 at 11:19 AM.
