Biden's Team Reportedly Thinks He's the Victim of a Bernie Sanders Conspiracy

You’d think that after being accused by multiple women of touching them in ways that made them feel deeply uncomfortable, former Vice President Joe Biden would be in for some introspection. Not so, according to a new report from Axios.

Apparently, the Biden camp thinks this is all the doing of Bernie Sanders, who’s been consistently polling right behind Biden in the early days of the 2020 cycle. Per Axios (emphasis theirs):

Why it matters: Several around Biden think advisers to Bernie Sanders are at least partly behind the anti-Biden campaign. One prominent backer thinks Biden will run, and “is ready to kill Bernie.”

I got this text last night from a source close to Biden:“VP directed staff this evening to reach out to supporters and donors with a simple message — full steam ahead.”

This theory has been circulating around the crank corners of the extremely online center since former Nevada legislator Lucy Flores’ essay about her encounter with Biden was published on The Cut on Friday, although it speaks volumes that it’s now something that appears to be widely accepted in Biden’s camp. One piece of “evidence” frequently cited is that Flores endorsed Bernie Sanders in 2016. According to an interview Flores gave to HuffPost, however, Flores not only said she hadn’t been in contact with the Sanders campaign at all, but said outright that she doesn’t plan to back him in 2020.

On Monday, a second woman came forward to accuse Biden of inappropriately touching her. Amy Lappos, a former congressional aide for Rep. Jim Himes, said that Biden “put his hand around my neck and pulled me in to rub noses with me,” which is just extremely weird shit.

The most bewildering part of all of this is that Sanders, like so many of his fellow colleagues, stupidly waded into this whole thing to defend Joe Biden when the Flores story broke. “I’m not sure that one incident alone disqualifies anybody” from the presidency, Sanders said in an appearance on Face the Nation on Sunday. What a well-oiled machine this conspiracy is.