"He’s a hometown kid done good, you know?” (Bernie's Brooklyn Campaign Office)
"Just over three weeks before the April 19th presidential primary, Brooklyn welcomed back its hometown candidate this morning, with over 300 Bernie Sanders supporters gathering to celebrate the opening of his campaign’s Gowanus office. A few months ago, it seemed like an impossibility that the Brooklyn-born Sanders would still be running a campaign strong enough to keep New York State competitive. While the most recent poll [pdf] has Bernie lagging behind his opponent Hillary Clinton (though that might change after today's caucuses), for supporters, the fight for the state is just beginning.
“As the only City Councilman supporting Bernie Sanders, I’m proud to be here today,” Councilman Rafael Espinal told the crowd. “I’m here today because Bernie Sanders stands up for my people. I represent East New York and Bushwick, some of the poorest neighborhoods in the state of New York and when Bernie speaks, he speaks for us, for the people that live here.”
“You can go back forty years ago, and Bernie was still saying the same things he is today,” said Linda Sarsour, the Executive Director of the Arab American Association,. “He’s a man who sees all of us, progressives, whites, blacks, Jews, Muslims, Latinos, as equals. He’s a man who believes in equal access to higher education. A man who believes we should all be able to afford to live in Brooklyn.”
While the Sanders campaign has found much of its success in liberal, mostly white states, the rally appeared to reflect a diversity slightly more in keeping with Brooklyn’s demographics, drawing supporters of all races and ages.
The most passionate speech of the morning came from Ohio State Senator Nina Turner, who has been one of the most outspoken boosters for Sanders nationwide. Reflecting on the holiday weekend, Turner told the audience “Not only was Jesus a revolutionary, but as my husband reminded me, he was a Socialist Jew.” The crowd erupted. “He wasn’t with the status quo, he was with the people.”
While many of the younger supporters voiced enthusiasm for Sanders’s platform, a few older attendees were more tactical in their endorsement.
“Hillary has a record, but it’s more like a criminal record at this point,” said former City Council candidate Gwen Goodwin of East Harlem. “And Trump is going to throw her under the bus in the debates. But Donald Trump has co-opted so much of Bernie’s good financial policies, that he can’t go after him for voting for NAFTA or TPP, because he didn’t. There’s nothing he can go after him on, so Trump will come out as a racist and a fascist, and Bernie will not.”
Park Slope resident Greg Algarin, 50, shared the excitement of some of the younger supporters in attendance.
“I think this makes for a great message. He’s a hometown kid done good, you know?”
http://gothamist.com/2016/03/26/photos_new_yorkers_feelthebern_at_o.php#photo-1