Does Bernie Want To Debate - Or Just Complain About Them

(The cartoon above is by Dave Granlund at davegranlund.com.)

If there's one thing the Bernie Sanders campaign has been consistent about, it is trying to portray himself as the poor downtrodden victim. And that seems to be what he is doing in New York now. He has challenged Hillary Clinton to a debate in New York before that state's April 19th primary. Clinton responded with three dates for holding such a debate. What did Sanders do? He turned down all three dates. Here is how Harper Neidig reports it in The Hill:

In a statement, Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon said the Sanders campaign had rejected three separate dates on which to hold a debate.

“The Sanders campaign needs to stop with the games,” Fallon said in the statement. “Over the course of the last week we have offered three specific dates for a debate in New York, all of which the Sanders campaign rejected."

The Clinton campaign first offered April 4 at 7:30 as a debate time, but Sanders' camp rejected it because they wanted a date after Wisconsin's April 5 primary, Fallon said.

“We then offered the night of April 14th and that was rejected by Sanders. While we preferred to do an evening debate on the 14th, we then agreed to a debate on Good Morning America on April 15, understanding that the Sanders campaign had already agreed to this forum. That, too, was rejected.”

Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs said in a statement Saturday that the dates proposed by Clinton’s team “don’t make a whole lot of sense.”

“The idea that they want a debate in New York on a night of the NCAA finals — with Syracuse in the tournament no less — is ludicrous,” he wrote.

April 4 is the night of the NCAA basketball championship.

Briggs’ statement did not address the offer to debate on April 14 or 15.

The Sanders campaign has repeatedly slammed Clinton after one of her aides suggested earlier this week that she would not agree to any more debates unless the Vermont senator changed his “tone.”

On Saturday, the Clinton campaign publicly offered to debate in mid-April, and criticized Sanders for his “negative attacks.”

“Both offers for the night April 14 and the morning of April 15 still remain,” the statement said. “The Sanders campaign needs to stop using the New York primary as a playground for political games and negative attacks against Hillary Clinton."

ABC has extended an invitation to both candidates to debate on “Good Morning America” on April 15, the network confirmed to CNN.