Twitter isn’t real life. But for Sanders fans, it’s a powerful tool – By Story Hinckley (CS Monitor) / March 2 2020
According to a Monitor analysis, supporters of Bernie Sanders are the most active and aggressive in their responses to other campaigns on Twitter. Many say it’s all in the service of a greater good.
“The Democratic party is a progressive party,” Elizabeth Warren’s official account tweeted last week, “even if there are a lot of people on the #DemDebate stage who don’t want to say so.” It was a jab at all the other Democratic candidates except for Bernie Sanders. And it’s easy to imagine Senator Sanders’ supporters “liking” that message.
But that’s not what happened.
The first response came one minute later from an account called @AmazingBernie, and it featured a photoshopped image of Senator Warren’s head on the body of a snake. Soon dozens of replies from Sanders supporters piled on top. “You’re a pathological liar,” wrote someone named Paul. “Go away Republican,” tweeted Robin. “YOU ARE NOT A PROGRESSIVE!” thundered an account named “I’m 1 of the Squad.”
It’s a recurring pattern. A candidate from a rival campaign sends out a tweet, and within minutes it is swarmed by hundreds, or thousands, of responses that are either supportive of Mr. Sanders, scathing towards his rivals, or both. A Monitor analysis of several hundred Twitter accounts – those most frequently responding directly to the five leading Democratic candidates over the past year – using data provided by researchers at George Washington University, found that the number of pro-Sanders accounts far exceeds supporters of any other Democratic campaign.
And while it’s become almost cliché to note that Twitter isn’t “real life,” that doesn’t mean it has no impact. During the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump proved Twitter’s power in agenda-setting, and he has continued to use it as an effective tool throughout his presidency. Among the thousands of campaign-related tweets analyzed by the Monitor, only Mr. Trump’s supporters rival Mr. Sanders’ in the quantity and often vitriolic nature of their replies.
Indeed, in the Democratic primary race, Sanders supporters have dominated the Twitterverse in a way that data experts and political scientists say is unlike anything they’ve ever seen.
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