During last year’s presidential campaign U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders told a crowd of about 10,000 supporters at National City’s Kimball Park that he wanted to close the gap between the rich and poor, bring about equal pay for women compared to their male counterparts and fix a “rigged economy.”
“I’m running for president because in the wealthiest nation in the history of the world too many people are living in poverty,” he said that night. “In the wealthiest nation in the history of the world not all of the new wealth and income should be going to the top 1 percent.”
Despite Sanders’ campaign rhetoric of a changed system, the Vermont senator has not paid National City $28,337.28 for the May rally that took place weeks before California held its primary and just before Hillary Clinton secured the Democratic nomination.
Now, National City is officially taking the 75-year-old former presidential candidate to court to recoup about $31,000 from him. The cost includes the $28,337.28 owed to them plus about $3,000 in penalties.
The National City City Council on Aug. 1 unanimously agreed to authorize the city attorney to file a lawsuit against the Bernie Sanders campaign.
“The City Council of National City approved the Temporary Use Permit for … Bernie’s 2016 rally per their Temporary Use Permit application,” said City Attorney Angil Morris- Jones. “Prior to the rally, the Bernie 2016 campaign staff were informed and agreed to pay the cost of the event permitas part of the approval process.
“To this date, they have failed to pay National City. In failing to pay the city the Bernie 2016 campaign breached their agreement and for such they are being sued.”
Deputy City Manager Stacey Stevenson said the lawsuit will be filed in Vermont, the site of Sanders’ campaign headquarters. The lawsuit will be handled by the collection agency Financial Credit Network.
As of Tuesday the lawsuit was being drafted.
Sanders’ campaign team did not respond to messages seeking comment for this story.
In previous attempts to receive payment the city sent Sanders’ campaign two delinquent notices. When Sanders or his campaign team did not reply to those notices, the city then sent them a demand letter, informing them that there is a debt owed to the city and that the city will use any legal recourse to recovery.
The demand letter proved to be unsuccessful, leaving National City to turn it to Financial Credit Network for collection. They too were unable to collect Sanders’ debt.
“They have been experiencing similar difficulties to what we’ve experienced (in collecting payment),” Stevenson said.
If successful in court, Financial Credit Network will receive a percentage of the total awarded judgment.
Stevenson said in the little dialogue the city has had with the Bernie Sanders Campaign, they said the Secret Service was the one responsible for the debt.
“When we’ve talk to the campaign they keep referring it to Secret Service and saying that the Secret Service is responsible for paying the bill, but then Secret Service would say ‘no, that’s the campaign,” she said.
“The Temporary Use Permit for the event was between the city and the campaign and so ultimately the campaign to us is responsible for the payment. The contractual relationship was between the city and the campaign.”
