Sanders suspends presidential campaign, says path to victory is 'virtually impossible'
Sen. Bernie Sanders tells supporters that his campaign is coming to an end but the movement is not.
CNN anchor John King made multiple false assertions about Sen. Bernie Sanders' address to supporters explaining his decision to suspend his 2020 presidential campaign.
"What struck me the most there in Senator Sanders saying goodbye [is he] did acknowledge that Joe Biden had an insurmountable lead, but he didn't say anything nice about Joe Biden," King said. "He did not say he had spoken to him, he did not say he would work with him. He said it was imperative to beat President Trump, but there was no big embrace of Joe Biden."
Except Sanders did have "nice" things to say about the presumptive Democratic nominee and did vow to "work" with him going forward.
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"Today I congratulate Joe Biden, a very decent man, who I will work with to move our progressive ideas forward," Sanders said during his livestreamed address.
Progressives took notice of King's assertions and blasted the CNN anchor on social media.
"The first thing CNN says after Bernie’s livestream? 'Bernie didn’t say anything nice about Joe Biden.' First, that’s not true. Second, are you based in reality?" prominent Sanders' supporter Nomiki Konst shot back.
"LOL. Bernie didn't say anything nice about Biden according to CNN?... Did CNN want him to propose marriage to Biden?" Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept quipped.
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Even CNN's own Jim Acosta contradicted King's claims.
King later apologized to Sanders on Twitter, pointing to "technical issues" that led to his errors.
"Harpoons deserved and accepted, and my apologies to Senator Sanders. We had some technical issues and I did not hear the 'I will work with' -- The error was mine and the blame lies with me not anyone else in the conversation," King wrote.
Sanders suspended his presidential campaign on Wednesday, effectively ensuring former Vice President Joe Biden will be the party's nominee even as the liberal Vermont senator vowed to continue to lead his "movement" into the future.
The senator, at one point the front-runner for the nomination, initially announced the decision during an all-staff conference call Wednesday morning, and followed up with an address livestreamed to supporters shortly before noon.
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Citing Biden’s lead of more than 300 convention delegates, Sanders declared: “The path toward victory is virtually impossible.”
He continued: “I have concluded that this battle for the Democratic nomination will not be successful. ... I do not make this decision lightly.”
In a curious moment, though, Sanders said that Biden "will be the nominee," yet went on to stress the importance of continuing to win delegates for his own campaign so he'll be able to exert "influence" on the party platform.
Fox News' Paul Steinhauser and Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
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