During the official roll call at the virtual Democratic National Convention on Tuesday, representatives from 57 states and territories declared their delegate totals for Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden, each from an iconic setting highlighting their region.
Native American delegates from the Dakotas and New Mexico greeted viewers in their indigenous languages. African American delegates spoke from Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, DC and the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.
The sweeping celebration of the Democratic Party’s diversity, however, also highlighted the party’s fracture between its centrist establishment and its emerging progressive wings. Yes, all the delegations enthusiastically declared Joe Biden “the next president of the United States.” But, Bernie Sanders’ delegate total of 1,151, compared to Biden’s 3,558, indicates the persistence of a significant ideological divide.
Two voices from the progressive wing were granted several minutes of airtime in Tuesday night’s program: Congressmember Alexandria Ocasio-Cortéz and Medicare-for-All
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