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Are Democrats failing to unify in the fight to beat Donald Trump? Here on day four of the Democratic National Committee Convention (DNCC) in Philadelphia, there is serious doubt on the part of some Bernie Sanders’ supporters that the call for unity is working. According to “California Bernie Delegates” co-chair, Dr. Bill Honigman from Orange County, “Very few in our delegation have come to the conclusion that they are ready for Hillary.” He adds ominously, “I’m not so sure Hillary can beat Trump.” 

More than twenty-five Bernie Sanders delegates and alternates were interviewed for this article and at least half are unsure, or will never vote for Clinton, while others will most likely move towards Hillary sooner or later. Almost all those interviewed say that by circling the wagons so tightly, especially by choosing Tim Kaine for vice president, someone they label “a moderate”, the Hillary Clinton campaign appears to be okay with leaving many potential foot soldiers, and voters, on the outside of the Democratic tent. 

It’s widely believed that Bernie Sanders supporters are passionate and hard working. Many of his 1,846 pledged delegates worked twelve and fifteen hour days, not just to get Bernie to Philadelphia, they say, but to inject Bernie’s message into the usually mainstream Democratic National Committee (DNC) platform document. According to several elected officials and party operatives, it would appear that the Sanders campaign, led by the California delegation, has indeed wrought profound progressive changes within the party’s platform. 

In fact, former California governor Gray Davis goes even further. Davis told the Planet, that “Bernie and his followers have already changed the face of American politics.” The ex-governor claims that “Sanders and Clinton have come up with the most progressive platform in my lifetime.” 

Sanders adherents keep pushing, though. Many are skeptical of Clinton’s ever pursuing single-payer healthcare, for example, and they also believe she will offer a wink and a nod as lame-duck president Barack Obama tries to push through Congress the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal. Until speeches by Kaine and Obama last night, the Sanders people said they hadn’t been feeling much love from a party they are trying to bust into. 

“We should all feel the ‘Bern’ and not want to get burned by that other guy,” said Kaine to a huge ovation. 

Later, Obama was more specific and laudatory towards Bernie’s supporters. 

“So if you agree that there’s too much inequality in our economy and too much money in our politics, we all need to be as vocal and as organized and as persistent as Bernie Sanders supporters have been during this election,” Obama said midway through his keynote address. 

There seems to be an attempt to reach out and keep Bernie Sanders supporters—a potential army of door-knockers, phone-callers, and talented social media devotees—from being left party-less. It’s still unclear if Hillary Clinton herself will make amends with those supporters or how many Sanders delegates are willing to come over to her side. 

In interview after interview the Bernie-istas seemed to be feeling understandably downcast because their candidate is not the nominee, but they were also upset that superdelegates were included in the pledged delegate count Tuesday night, and that the whole convention seems like a preordained “dog and pony show.” But most often it was the ‘d’ word Sanders’ delegates used: “disrespected.” They were feeling no love from the Clinton camp. One of them even thought Bill Clinton lost an opportunity Tuesday night to build some party unity, to reach out to Sanders supporters and invite them to join the campaign, maybe even to bring Hillary and Bernie out on stage together and stand between them. 

Many Sanders supporters said they are anxiously awaiting her Thursday speech, wondering if she will extend an olive branch to the almost nineteen hundred delegates representing nearly thirteen million voters. After all, Sanders prevailed in twenty-two states. She might lay out the case as to why they should not join her, but why she would like to join them in defeating Donald Trump. It would be a bold and healing move. 

It’s clear that many Sanders delegates, all of whom mentioned here are long-time Democrats, are just not comfortable at the convention. They complain about the corporate sponsored breakfasts and logoed official canvas bags, the sometimes esoteric rules, and the DNC personnel grabbing at their Bernie and anti-TPP signs on the convention floor as examples. 

Several thought that there would be a chance to have real conversations, “to discuss policy issues,” according to Robert Shearer, a botanist and delegate from Humboldt County. 

“I understand unity but it’s too much too soon, it’s being forced on us,” said Laura Solis, a paralegal and delegate from Agoura Hills. Michael Riley Brown, a Santa Barbara delegate said, “At minimum, all we want is that they [DNC] play by the rules.” 

But the newbie delegates, along with feeling like they are unwelcome guests at a garden party, also say they are being steamrolled by party rules, which many veterans of past conventions know by heart and often use to squelch dissent on the floor, especially since so much of this gathering is being stage-managed for a national TV audience. 

Many Democrats continue to wonder where Bernie voters will end up this November. Shearer said that these voters will go “in all directions.” 

Perhaps the two extremes are represented by San Francisco delegate, Benjamin Becker, “This is the Democrat Party and it’s totally corrupt,” and San Fernando Valley delegate, Farid Ben Amor who “will support Hillary” Clinton without reservation. But somewhere between those two are delegates who are intensely focused on finding a way to “stop this country’s march toward fascism” as one of them was keen to point out. 

Sandra Reding, 57, is a nurse and a Sanders delegate from Bakersfield. When I caught up with her she was wearing a red t-shirt and sitting with several delegates who are nurses and also wearing red, a popular color among Bernie people. The California delegation breakfast was just ending, and Reding, an operating room nurse, said she sees lots of people who have no insurance or are under-insured coming through her hospital. She’s drawn to Sanders because of his stand on single-payer health care. 

“Bernie has always said the movement is beyond the man,” Reding said. She’s a strong union member and points over to the president of National Nurses Unite to reinforce her point. She’s not sure how she will vote in November but, “as a union we endorsed Bernie, and we will go back to our base and find out what’s the will of the membership.” Reding adds, “She [Hillary] has to earn our support. The platform should have included Medicare for all.” 

Bob Nelson is a retired astrophysicist, formerly at NASA and Cal Tech. He’s a Bernie Sanders supporter from Pasadena and this is his third convention. He was a delegate for Jesse Jackson in 1988 and Jerry Brown in 1992. Nelson’s tall, with wire rim glasses, sports a blue blazer and has a half inch gray beard. He says he believes in socialism and is glad it is making a comeback within the Democratic party. 

“It has not been a welcoming environment for first time delegates,” Nelson says. “I’m extremely disappointed that Bill Clinton could talk for an hour and not talk about our platform.” 

He says he’s not sure right now who he will vote for: “I’ll have to listen to what she says because this election has become one about fascism.” Nelson says that fascism thrives when the opposition is fragmented, and “the Clintons want us to go away, but they also want us to lick their postage stamps.” He says the Democrats welcomed African Americans and gays, “so now socialists can come out of the closet.” He smiles like someone in it for the long haul. 

Natasha Acevedo, 25, said she worked long days for the Bernie Sanders campaign in El Paso, Texas. She’s an educator and childcare provider at Fort Bliss. She’s also wearing a bright red t-shirt with ‘Democratic Socialists’ emblazoned in white letters. Acevedo was walking in the cavernous Pennsylvania Convention Center trying to find the “ethnic caucus” meeting when I flagged her down. 

“If we really want to build unity and progressive values we have to change our language and dialogue,” she says. She would like a Hillary delegate to just come up and ask why she supports Bernie Sanders. “We got the country to see his platform,” Acevedo says. 

She’s been doing some soul searching too. “I came to the convention ‘Bernie or Bust.’” She began fighting back tears. It’s a sad realization because we worked so hard…I don’t agree with (Clinton) her or her background, but it’s about the platform and we influenced it so much.” Acevedo goes on to say that it would be a shame not to pass the platform, and electing Hillary Clinton would be celebrating the work that so many Sanders delegates have done. 

“I will vote for this candidate,” she says with tears still in her eyes and obviously wrestling with this decision even as she speaks. “Voting for Jill Stein would be a sign of protest, and that time is over because there’s a lot at stake in this election.” 

Acevedo was perhaps most firm when she said, “We are going to hold this party accountable” and then adds, “and I’m glad we will have female representation.” 

How will Bernie Sanders delegates and supporters come around to supporting Hillary? If it’s up to Sanders supporters it will not be because of all the past good work she’s done, or because they want to elect the first woman president. What Bernie-istas want from her, if they don’t get recognition for changing political history, is a firm promise to implement the party platform that they fought so hard to bring about. 

Possibly the disillusionment felt by most Sanders delegates interviewed can be summed up by Sacramento’s Jrmar Jefferson, 35, a one-time reality TV constestant who recently lost out to incumbent Doris Matsui in a race for congress in California’s 6^th congressional district. 

“Why isn’t she reaching out to Sanders voters?” he wondered. “The problem with the Democratic Party is that we got fans.” Jefferson smiles and looks across the arena at the vast sea of glittering colors and symbols that display some of the convention theater. “Delegates are fans and they came here to be entertained, not to make change.” 

Congresswoman Barbara Lee, who represents Berkeley and Oakland and was a member of the convention’s platform committee, got the last word. The Planet caught up with her on the convention floor, sitting in the first row of the California delegation. Why should Bernie delegates vote for Hillary Clinton? 

“My best argument would be to look at our party platform, the values and aspirations of our party,” she said. She paused and gathered her breath as crowds moved around us, some pushing and shoving, with an endless stream of TV cameras on parade. 

“In the platform is language abolishing the death penalty, overturning Citizens United, addressing student debt and institutional racism, a $15 minimum wage and universal pre-school,” she said, maintaining intense eye contact as thousands continued to mill around us. “There’s no way we can allow a Donald Trump into the white house.” 

She said she voted on the draft platform with Bernie “95% of the time” and “I’m going to work with Bernie people, and Bernie, to elect Hillary Clinton.” Lee said her first convention was in 1972, working for presidential candidate Shirley Chisholm, who had “something like 400 delegates.” 

When Chisholm was soundly defeated, Lee wanted to throw in the towel on politics: “I said forget it, but Shirley said no, stay with the party…and she was right, it paved the way for Jesse Jackson, Barack Obama and now Hillary Clinton.”