from WALL ST. $HILL DOT COM.

Niko House is the President of North Carolina College Students for Bernie Sanders. In a recent video posted to youtube, he describes the orchestrated infiltration of the Bernie Sanders campaign in that state by well-connected DNC operatives. House goes into great detail to describe intimidation tactics used against his group that seemed counterproductive – suppression of advertising for events, reaching out to the community, etc.

He goes into some detail explaining that the outsiders who stepped in and took over the campaign from the initial grassroots organizers made what seemed like a concerted effort to not reach out to black leaders in North Carolina and basically ran the campaign into the ground. The videos are worth a watch and pretty illuminating. I’d also say they’re disturbing, but we’ve all come to expect these types of tricks from the Clinton campaign.

The first video is some background and in the second he starts naming names. This is fascinating stuff. You’re not going to see this on the neoliberal corporate media.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbR2INJtkfo&feature=youtu.be]

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeD-ODrfKqU&feature=youtu.be]

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQTpNpn2cDo&feature=youtu.be]

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To me, Fentress, this guy is years younger than me and seems a bit flakey, but that's MY perceptional filter. If the facts are accurate this is pretty sickening. Not sick .Sickening.

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Thanks for posting them. I'll take a look tomorrow when it isn't so late. There was a telephone number to report campaign irregularities to the Bernie campaign. I wonder if he did. If you have a bunch of young kids, I would think it would be pretty easy to muscle them right out of their group.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

I can only stay online and read shit about the campaigns before I start to feel my blood pressure creeping up, my feet swelling, my head starting to pound.. literally I can make myself have a coronary or a stroke. don't care to do either.

In the past 11 months, I managed to get 55 people registere to vote in a rather complacent, more white than minority, relatively well-off Pac NW town of around 60K north of Seattle. Fifty five people in a town where I don't even have a close friend or a go to coffee buddy after 7 years of living here in a house I bought a year before my husband died.

ALL of those are poor, most are minority, MANY are elderly women who will nag their spouses if they're still living or vote in spite of how their spouses vote if differently -- and those single will vote Democrat; and I still have hope that that means Sanders -- OR they are millennials or near millennials and will be votimg for the first time this major election. I have a phone number for each and as soon as our paper ballots go out, I'll be calling each one about completing them and offering them stamps, a ride to drop of the ballot without mailing it as an alternative, etc..

Back when I live in Texas, we did "drive five"..that is pick up five people to go to the polls with you and vote when you did. It was a Democratic party tactic.. even if all the votes weren't the same as mine, usually they more than cancelled out Republicans. Here, the ballots are all paper.

Best I can do.

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Muerte al fascismo. Muerte a la tiranía. colapso total de los que promueven tampoco. A la pared con el unico porciento%

rezolution's picture

In North Carolina and in other states as well?

I'd really like to feel as if the Sanders campaign is going to jump on this quickly, but I don't know what to expect.

I know that I was already feeling cheated and dirty-tricked way too much already, even before listening to these recordings. I have, in the past, said I would vote for Hillary if I have to, but my position is changing on that. Seems like we're fucked no matter what we do, so... vote with my conscience, that will have to be my answer.

Meanwhile Hillary supporters are more optimistic than ever. They have been complicit, all along, in supporting the roadblocks that diverted this primary from a fair appraisal of Sanders. Their next goal: win the GE. For that they will need those Sanders voters they kicked aside. Oops.

They are idiots, and they keep proving it. But dishonesty and covert operations apparently have been their standard for way too long to change now.

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The dailykos story is deleted. The most telling link is the one to twitter.

https://mobile.twitter.com/AishaDew/status/662815125846536192

Together, it certain lends credibility to the claim she's a Hillary plant. There isn't anything so scummy that I wouldn't believe it if it involved the Clintons.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

I notice, you contacted Nico Glad you did. I went to bed and wish I could have slept until the ballots arrive here by mail. ::sigh::

TOP pulled the article about the DNC operatives infiltrating the Sanders campaign.

I BELIEVE Nico. He's too close to but *not* flakey, IMO, to have made this up.

I hope no one does a drive-by on the young man. He's so sincere.. and no I have no idea why that popped into my head, but it did.

Fentress

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Muerte al fascismo. Muerte a la tiranía. colapso total de los que promueven tampoco. A la pared con el unico porciento%

Steven D's picture

I want to see more evidence but what I have heard is very disturbing.

http://bayareaforbernie.com/2015/10/18/no-ordinary-man-a-profile-on-niko...

During this summer, Niko went on to form Carolina Students for Bernie Sanders from scratch. It is an organization of University of North Carolina students who support Bernie Sanders’s presidential candidacy. Niko was contacted by Nate Rifkin, a field organizer for the official campaign, to start the organization because of the lack of political infrastructure in the U.S. South in support of Bernie Sanders.

The organization grew rapidly and became efficiently organized in a short span of time. There are currently between 200 and 250 active members and six committees in the organization. The Sanders campaign itself has said that Carolina Students for Bernie Sanders is one of the most organized pro-Bernie Sanders clubs in the entire country. Niko tells me that the organization is “putting a foundation in place that’s build around educating the community about local politics as well as national politics, giving a scope on some the policies that are passed and how they really affect people versus how the politicians will spin them.”

Niko first became interested in Sanders when found out that Sanders was an independent running for the Democratic ticket. Interestingly enough, Niko didn’t always start off as enthusiastic for the campaign. When Niko was first asked to start Carolina Students for Bernie, his initial reaction was laughter. He jokingly told Nate that “Sanders has about 2% of the vote, with a 2% margin of error.” However, Niko began to research Sanders and things have never been the same. Although Niko admires Sanders’s clean track record, it’s Sanders’s failures that really impressed Niko. “[Bernie’s] failures weren’t simply losing an election. He lost the elections that he did because he was very avid about the policies he’s advocating for now.” Most importantly, Sanders “never sacrificed his morals to gain political office.”

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

jiordan's picture

I absolutely believe him. It should have been obvious from the whole debacle at the Moral Monday March. If you look at that as sabotage instead of stupidity, the fact that Bernie's support kept getting undercut (I sent several emails to the campaign asking to volunteer and got no response--for 2 months) makes sense. And they didn't have an office in Western NC except Asheville--which was run by locals, not anyone in the "official" campaign--and Bernie cleaned up 2 to 1 in my area.

The sentence that made me really shudder though, was when he said every group he's talked to in every state where Bernie won, did so by staying away from the official campaign. There are lots of delegate rich states coming up. With a level playing field, I think he'd sweep them, but if the people in the Sanders campaign can't be trusted...

At least now I know why NC felt like a win for Bernie and turned out to be a loss.

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gulfgal98's picture

were in western NC, where there was probably less of the national presence. I know that there was no office in Transylvania county which Bernie won.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

smiley7's picture

deprived their right to vote in many ways across NC. LC did a good diary which I don't wish to link to, but presume you saw it as well.

Repug shenanigans were the order of the day last Tuesday.

In our university community, the Republican controlled county BOE moved the campus precinct away from the student union where it has been for years to an inconvenient place bordering the university and in addition, the BOE had only a few voting booths and machines in place; making the lines extremely long, so long in fact, I’m confident that many voters didn’t wait. The precinct also contains neighborhoods where many seniors live.

This was deliberate, many voting machine were placed in low turnout precincts where locals report that election workers were bored, having nothing to do.

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gulfgal98's picture

Warren Wilson College, which is very liberal, was split into two precincts to dilute the student vote for state reps, etc. Previously, Warren Wilson College was in a single precinct with all on campus students voting at the same polling place. In 2014, the on campus housing was split into two precincts. Many student had no idea which one they were vote in. It was a horrible mess.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

smiley7's picture

Dem. Party in town surrounded by a sea of Red. But all the stress, mostly coming from top down, Raleigh, has caused an unfortunate split in our local leadership; weakening our group at the worst possible time. As usual, to the best of my understanding, the bad will was caused by 'money,' development decisions on the town council, a betrayal in many ways.
Between a rock and hard place as I've close friends on both sides. In the meantime, the Repugs are steamrolling...

BTW, this is a good non-profit journalistic site for western NC for everyone: http://www.carolinapublicpress.org/

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jiordan's picture

I'm in Western NC and I didn't know about that site. Bookmarked now Smile

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smiley7's picture

You are welcome. The site is reasonably new, just a few years old. I do enjoy the work there. Smile
Glad to see you here!

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scares the hell out of me...

Fentress

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Muerte al fascismo. Muerte a la tiranía. colapso total de los que promueven tampoco. A la pared con el unico porciento%

mawnjilla's picture

at least on reddit. and of course on GOS there are plenty of CT excuses being made. I agree that this guy sounds credible, I wouldn't be surprised if he's overreacting or potentially even stirring shit himself . I tend to believe that the DNC would be more than capable of making such shenanigans happen though. I really want to know if there will be a response from the top about this, and if the people being accused of sabotage will remain in the campaign. Will this all be labeled as CT and go into obscurity? Some NC people need to vouch for this guy's claims if they are to be taken seriously, as believable as they sound.

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bern baby bern disco inberno

Bisbonian's picture

here in Arizona. My partner has been the lead in organizing our county, purely on a volunteer basis. Months later, she was contacted by the official campaign, who insisted on scheduling a meeting during an event she had set up, a debate party in the local theater here in town. During the debate! (At a local restaurant that was actually closed at that hour!) Then, AFTER the cutoff to register as a Dem to vote for Bernie in our "Presidential Preference Election", the campaign showed up, and started giving orders. In particular, the leader insisted on canvassing a part of town that is practically ALL voting for Bernie, has already voted by mail in almost all cases, and lives on steep hillsides only accessible by huge stairways! The real effort needed to be made in a part of town that was far more 'low information voters', and also much easier to go door to door, but that was shut down.

Farther North, the Progressive Democrats for Arizona set up an actual campaign headquarters, printed up Bernie shirts, sent representatives down south to talk to us and coordinate efforts with us. The official Sanders campaign crew showed up last minute, ignored their efforts, and charged off in their own directions...duplicating efforts and ignoring other needs.

I lean toward chalking it up to inexperience among the staff, as well as incompetence, and some real egos, but my partner saw this film and agreed that some of the acts were suspiciously like False Flag actions. What really caught her attention was that one of the people mentioned in the film was the same person that raised the stink about "Bernie Supporters being banned from marching with the Moral Mondays group in N. Carolina"...which turned out to be false, as well as embarrassing.

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"I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.” —Malcolm X

Jazzenterprises's picture

of course, but I'm waiting this one out to see what happens.

Can she really be that stupid? North Carolina? Completely unnecessary if true which is what makes it idiotic. I honestly expected her to take that state easily... so weird. I know its proportional, but really? Please let this not be true... (yes, that is where I'm at with her).

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Progressive to the bone.

Steven D's picture

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/2/17/1485450/-Repairing-the-breach-Sa...

Yesterday I woke up to a shocking email from the State Coordinator for North Carolina for Bernie Sanders. It put the brakes on three weeks of work organizing to bring Bernie supporters together for HKonJ, the Mass Moral March, tomorrow. Aisha Dew wrote: “Please take down all HK on J events from social media. Rev. Barber does not want us to attend the event. He asked us to take the event down off of all social media.

I begin to see a pattern developing.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

gulfgal98's picture

is prohibited from endorsing candidates, so I am not sure how that plugged into the HKonJ march which originated out of the North Carolina NAACP office of which Reverend Barber is the head.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

Steven D's picture

to attend Moral Mondays. This caused a big "rift" between Daily Kos and Barber in which Barber called out DKos:

More from the diary:

The assertion by state coordinator Dew, as reported by Watson, that “Rev. Barber does not want us to attend the event” was, as Rev Barber thundered from a podium the next day at the march, “a damn lie!” What is true is that NC-NAACP has a long-standing and well-known policy against providing political candidates with a forum for their campaign messaging. Only Bernie supporters’ campaign signage and tee shirts were unwelcome at the march; Bernie supporters themselves most certainly were welcome with open arms (contrary to Dew’s alleged email).

Amateur volunteer Watson, inflamed by her enthusiasms, may perhaps be forgiven for her inability to grasp the distinction between signage and bodies. But political pro Dew cannot be similarly forgiven for her amateurish and damaging misrepresentations.

Neither Dew nor Watson have responded to my invitations to relate their side of the story for this article.

Now maybe Dew did not send the email. If so, why did she not respond to deny telling Sanders volunteers they were not welcome at Moral Monday's events?

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Steven D's picture

He promised to send me emails that substantiate the claims made.

Said since he went public, he has been hearing from volunteers in other states who have similar complaints regarding the performance of Sanders paid campaign staff regarding volunteer participation in their states.

About Aisha Dew, said he had seen facebook posts prior to her hiring by the Sanders campaign that said she was phone banking for Hillary. Said that she had also posted many pictures to her facebook page with her and prominet Hillary supporters, all of which have since been removed except for the Debbie Wasserman Schulz photo.

Also claimed that while she headed up Bernie's campaign in NC, she refused to meet with NC politicians and other figures who wished to endorse Sanders, including Chris Rei, former Mayor of Sring Lake, NC, and US Senate candidate who lost in the primary to Deborah Ross, the favored establishment candidate.

Niko is a very passionate young man, and he speaks in person just like he does on the video - very rapidly and jumps from topic to topic. Had to ask him to slow down a bit.

I will fill everyone in with more after I receive what he promised to send me.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

jiordan's picture

as being an NC resident, I noticed that the Sanders campaign seemed to have a much better presence in the early days before the official campaign people showed up. And that Moral Monday's March debacle stank from the beginning. As I recall, there was a thread on TOS where people posted screens shots of facebook posts and emails that would corroborate some of what Nico is talking about.

I'm looking forward to the rest of this tale.

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For followups. You're clear, where I get fuzzy.

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******************************

Muerte al fascismo. Muerte a la tiranía. colapso total de los que promueven tampoco. A la pared con el unico porciento%

Bisbonian's picture

The Sanders campaign (or those posing as the Sanders campaign, if that is what was going on) wanted to carry Bernie signs and all that, which was not what the march was about. The Rev. Barber asked them to please leave the signs at home, but they were more than welcome, encouraged to march. That message was not relayed accurately.

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"I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.” —Malcolm X

Steven D's picture

http://caucus99percent.com/comment/38897#comment-38897

If Dew did not send the email, why not publicly deny it?

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Phoebe Loosinhouse's picture

Maybe he should turn down all attempts to "help" him from the Party and just rely on the volunteers to organize themselves.

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" “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.” FDR "

Steven D's picture

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Steven D's picture

This is regarding the Moral Monday's March and info Sanders' NC campaign was relaying to volunteers in Wilmington and Brunswick counties:

Note that they are identical in what is said in the first two sentences. After that, local folks in those counties added their own text, which explains the variation.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Steven D's picture

support Niko House's claim that Bernie's NC campaign deactivated all events related to the Moral Monday's March Feb 13th
and cancelled all buses that would have transported Bernie supporters to that event, even though the HRC sites did not.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

to find out this is true, not at all.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

I used to be very active in the NC Democratic Party at the local and state level, and I know without a doubt that corruption runs rampant throughout the system. Rev. Barber would not discourage anyone from attending the HJonK march. The people who received the notices that Barber didn't want Sanders supporters to participate in the march should've laughed and said, "Yeah, right." Obviously, a lot of the young folks in the campaign haven't been around long enough to recognize dirty tricks.

I've been fighting for many of the same ideals that Sanders advocates, and the "establishment" in the Democratic Party always tried to shut down the progressives in the party. It's a nasty game when people want money, power, and prestige, and some people will stop at nothing to get their way and get their candidate elected.

Hang in there, Niko and all Sanders supporters. Keep fighting the good fight, and don't stoop down to the opponents' level. Expose what you can with honesty and integrity. The mainstream media likely won't get involved in exposing very much about the Clinton campaign because frankly the media executives are afraid of what Sanders stands for. Big corporations own the majority of media outlets in America, and they don't want a reformer in the White House when they've got it good. As the famous poem says, "The revolution will not be televised."

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