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Symone Sanders Said Dems Don’t Need White People To Lead. She Went To Work For Joe Biden

Noam Galai/Getty Images for Global Citizen

Virginia Kruta Associate Editor
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Symone Sanders has signed on as a senior adviser to newly-declared 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, despite her 2016 claim that Democrats didn’t “need white people leading” the party.

Sanders shared the announcement Thursday on Twitter, via the Associated Press.

Sanders, who served as press secretary for independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders during his 2016 presidential run, told CNN’s Brianna Keilar just weeks after the 2016 election that it was time for the Democratic Party to reflect its diversity in its leadership.

Keilar asked what Sanders thought about Keith Ellison possibly taking over as Democratic National Committee Chairman (Ellison eventually lost to former Labor Secretary Tom Perez), and Sanders said that she hadn’t yet decided who she might support. (RELATED: Keith Ellison Resigns From The DNC)

She did note that she was not a fan of former DNC chair Howard Dean returning to the position, saying, “In my opinion we don’t need white people leading the Democratic party right now. The Democratic Party is diverse, and it should be reflected as so in leadership and throughout the staff, at the highest levels. From the vice chairs to the secretaries all the way down to the people working in the offices at the DNC.”

Politico also noted that, in the weeks before she officially signed on with the Biden campaign, Sanders had donated to the campaign of South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg. She fired right back, saying, “Lol yes. I also donated to Castro and Gillibrand because I believed then and do now that they all should have their shot on the debate stage.”

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