Havt: Bernie Sanders one of world’s ‘most powerful’ politicians
Ari Rabin Havt, former campaign manager and aide to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), offers rare behind-the-scenes insight into the progressive leader in his new book, “The Fighting Soul: On the Road with Bernie Sanders.”
Havt’s new book chronicles Sanders’ life on the road during the 2020 presidential election cycle, when Havt served as Sanders’ campaign manager. The book also enters Sanders‘ highly guarded private life.
“Very few people have really profiled him,” Havt said during his appearance on Hill.TV’s “Rising.” “Very few people know who he is and what he is about and I feel like I have a unique take on the story. I had this real privilege to be by his side for three years, traveling in 35 states, on picket lines, in restaurants and in cars and on planes.
“I wanted to give people that image because he’s such an important figure in history,” Havt added.
Havt said that despite rising to fame late in his life and career, Sanders is as authentic on camera as he is behind it.
“He’s him no matter what. That’s the thing about Bernie is Bernie is Bernie, whether or not there’s a camera. But I think he really absorbed what it meant. I think in many ways it shocked him, didn’t it? I said.
“In his 70s, going from being a senator, but relatively unknown outside of a small circle on the left, to being one of the most famous people in the world, one of the most powerful people in Washington” , he added.
Havt said that although he did not win a presidential election, Sanders had as much prominence in American politics as other prominent politicians, including former Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan and President Theodore Roosevelt, who lost his second run for the presidency in 1912.
“Bernie Sanders is one of the most important historical figures of the 21st century. He is probably one of the most important personalities who did not win the presidency. You know, you think of William Jennings Bryan, you think of Theodore Roosevelt in 1912, and then I think Bernie is kind of in the category of changing the Democratic Party.