Trump mocks Sanders for protester interruptions

by Mark Hensch - 08/22/15 5:47 PM ET

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is taunting Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) for his recent incidents with the Black Lives Matter movement.

Trump on Saturday said Sanders’s concessions to the group’s activists show he is a weak option for the White House in 2016.

“How is Bernie Sanders going to defend our country if he can’t even defend his own microphone?” he tweeted.

{mosads}Trump also took issue with reports that Sanders outdrew him when the two men held events days apart in Phoenix in July.

“I had 15,000 people in Phoenix but @politico said ‘the room’s capacity is just over 2000,’ ” he tweeted. “But said Bernie Sanders had 11,000 in same room.”

Trump attracted more than 4,200 supporters at the Phoenix Convention Center during a stop there last month, according to The Phoenix Business Journal.

Sanders, the report said, drew a crowd of at least 11,000 listeners a week later by appearing in a larger room at the same venue.

Trump’s attacks on Sanders come as the Vermont lawmaker has repeatedly struggled with race relations on the campaign trail.

Protesters affiliated with Black Lives Matter interrupted Sanders during public appearances in Phoenix and Seattle earlier this summer.

He has since redoubled his efforts on reaching minority voters, all while reiterating his long history of civil rights activism.

“The bad news is that racism still remains a much too real part of American life,” Sanders told listeners in Columbia, S.C., on Friday.

“There is no one who will fight harder not only to end institutional racism, but to make fundamental changes in our broken criminal justice system,” he added.

Sanders plans on meeting privately with black leaders while in South Carolina this weekend.

He is also speaking face to face with a representative of the Black Lives Matter coalition next week.

Black Lives Matter announced Friday that it has an official platform for curbing police violence and reforming criminal justice in the U.S. Its new website, Campaign Zero, calls for sweeping legislative reforms at the federal and state levels.

The coalition is pushing for restrictions on the use of deadly force by law enforcement, outlawing military supplies to police departments and training against racial bias.

It is also stumping for a federal database documenting all incidents featuring police brutality, the website said.

Tags Bernie Sanders Donald Trump