The New York Times
March 28th, 2016
Former Vice-President Al Gore
Feed Me Gore?
Following the March 15th Democratic primaries which saw Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders demolish former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, many in the Democratic primary began to panic and looked for several different candidates that could stop Senator Sanders. A wide variety of names were passed around on talk shows from West Virginia Senator and Conservative Democrat Joe Manchin to CNN journalist Wolf Blitzer. The upcoming primaries in Arizona saw some state Democrats starting a campaign for the state's former Governor Janet Napolitano. Others turned to Vice-President Joe Biden who had previously declined to run, and he received several write-in votes. Fewer threw their support behind the then-minor candidate businessman Rocky De La Fuente who would beat out Biden in some states mainly because he actively campaigned.
Despite the emergence of a few grassroots campaigns many in the party still felt that there was not a suitable opponent to Sanders (quite a turn of events considering the same was said of Clinton months before). Last Week Tonight with John Oliver ran a segment on the primaries. At the end several clips of an unintentionally funny interview with Rocky de La Fuente were played. At one point Fuente said "Yeah I think that I'm more qualified than anyone. I'm more qualified than Bernie Sanders. I'm more qualified than Hillary Clinton. I'm more qualified than...uh...Al Gore." The audience roared with laugther at the mention of the former Vice-President. Oliver ended the show by asking viewers to tweet "#RockyGore." A short mock boxing promo was aired with clips of Gore, Fuente, and scenes from the movie Rocky IV.
Last Week Tonight Host John Oliver
The hastag blew up on social media, and led to Gore getting invited onto the Daily Show with Trevor Noah. Although Gore had agreed to go on the show to talk about his climate change activism, Noah comedically dropped some references to a Presidential run and at the end of the interview Noah even said "Thank you for coming on the show. Ladies and Gentlemen give it up for Presidential Nomi-" before correcting himself.
However, the running gag of Gore running for president soon became a serious possibility for many. Some started to print out signs saying "Gore for President 2016" and plant them on their lawns. A twitter account called "Gore2016" was created and gained a considerable following by tweeting out the pros of a Gore presidency.
Although the grassroots campaign seemed rather harmless at first it became a bit more serious come March 22nd when the results came in.
Arizona
Sanders 61.2% 55 delegates
Clinton 22.3% 20 delegates
Napolitano 12.3%
Gore 2.2%
De La Fuente 1.4%
Biden 0.6%
Cruz 49.6% 58 delegates
Trump 42.5%
Kasich 7.3%
Utah
Sanders 71.4% 33 delegates
Clinton 9.3%
Gore 5.4%
Biden 2.1%
De La Fuente 1.8%
Cruz 72.1% 40 delegates
Trump 20.1%
Kasich 5.6%
Idaho
Sanders 67.3% 18 delegates
Clinton 18.5% 5 delegates
Gore 6.5%
Biden 4.4%
De La Fuente 2.3%
Gore, Biden, and de La Fuente performed well in several states. Napolitano almost reached the viability threshold in her home state. The next day she said that she would not be running and most of her supporters ran to Gore and Biden. Gore's successes led to him an interview on the Colbert Show where, in addition to some comedic mentions of the presidency, Gore gave an emotional few minutes on climate change and how it is being shoved aside in the Presidential campaign in favor of "Wall Street and the 'Big Banks'." The interview hit home with many Democrats concerned about the future of the environment and the planet. Was it enough to convince voters that a Gore 2016 was what they needed?
Alaska
Sanders 63.6% 12 delegates
Gore 19.3% 4 delegates
Clinton 12.4%
De La Fuente 2.9%
Biden 1.8%
Hawaii
Sanders 61.2% 19 delegates
Clinton 20.4% 6 delegates
Gore 14.5%
Biden 2.4%
De La Fuente 1.5%
Washington
Sanders 73.5% 101 delegates
Gore 8.4%
Clinton 6.5%
Biden 0.9%
De La Fuente 0.7%
Total
Sanders 238 delegates
Clinton 31 delegates
Gore 4 delegates
Biden 0 delegates
De La Fuente 0 delegates
Cruz 98 delegates
Trump 0 delegates
Kasich 0 delegates
On Saturday Goreans ((>.>)) upset the Clinton campaign, grabbing second place in two of the three states and picking up four delegates from Alaska. Although the day was largely won by Sanders, who had received over 90% of the delegates. But the media mainly focused on Gore's second places with headlines saying "GORE SCORES MAJOR COUP" and "THE GHOST OF NIXON WATCHES OVER GORE." Gore announced on March 27th his candidacy for the Democratic Presidential nomination. This, in addition to Cruz victories in both Utah and Arizona, meant that the race for the White House was only just beginning to heat up.
