Bernie Sanders Stopped Iowa Rally Speech to Help Supporters Standing Behind Him

Bernie Sanders has been showing more of his personality and humor during his speeches on the 2020 campaign trail, including a focus on encouraging people to remember that the campaign is not about him but about everyone. He demonstrated this in action tonight during his Fairfield, Iowa rally when he stopped his speech to check on the health of his supporters who were standing behind him. (The first photo above is from Bernie’s live stream and the photo next to it on the right was shared with Heavy by Daniel Clark, who is quoted later in this story.)

(To read more about what happened in the rest of the rally, read Heavy’s recap here.)

Bernie stopped his speech when someone behind him started feeling sick and had to be taken off stage. You could hear Bernie say, “Oh my god,” as he turned around. Then he walked over to see what was happening with the crowd around him. As one person was led off stage, he stopped and asked the others who were standing behind him: “Are you all right?” and checked on them to make sure everyone was feeling OK.

During his speech, you can see a woman stopping to turn as someone else isn’t feeling well next to her, according to people who were there:

YouTube/Bernie Sanders

Bernie stopped to see what was happening and you could hear him say, “Oh my god.”

YouTube/Bernie Sanders

He abandons his speech to find out what’s happening and help.

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And then he stops to talk to the crowd behind him, asking if everyone is OK.

YouTube/Bernie Sanders

The turnout for the Fairfield rally was so large that they were at max capacity and had to move some people to overflow space, shared Daniel Clark, who volunteered at the event today. Clark is running as a Democratic progressive for the U.S. House 2nd District of Iowa in 2020.

Clark told Heavy that he was a door counter and counted 539 people today, not including volunteers. With such a big turnout, stopping his rally to help his supporters got a lot of attention from the people watching the rally in person and the people watching online.

Bradley Bloom, a musician and producer, said about what happened on Twitter: “I think a woman was feeling faint, Bernie visibly alarmed stopped speaking, helped her off stage, asked everyone standing on stage if they were alright, said anyone feeling faint to not hesitate to go off-stage, then continued speaking. Well done.”

It was just another sign that Bernie is paying close attention to the people around him and running a campaign focused on the idea of “Not Me, But Us,” a slogan that he constantly reminds his supporters about. When people chanted “Bernie! Bernie” later, he said: “No, no. It’s not Bernie, it’s you.”

(To read more about what happened in the rest of the rally, read Heavy’s recap here.) 

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