Bernie Sanders's moment is calling him -- in the U.S. Senate

[Zorro]

The Democratic race for president is over. On Tuesday night, former vice president Joe Biden continued his remarkable run of primary victories, sweeping away Sen. Bernie Sanders’s challenges in Florida, Illinois and Arizona. As he did in Michigan and Mississippi a week before, Biden dominated the most important contest of the evening — Sanders (I-Vt.) did not win a single county in Florida. After Biden’s commanding performance on Super Tuesday, I cautioned that Democratic leaders should not push Sanders out of the race too quickly. That was then; this is now.

The United States finds itself in the midst of a crisis that is without parallel. Health-care experts warn that our emergency rooms may soon turn into war zones, unemployment could rise as high as 20 percent and worker’s retirement accounts can expect to fall even further on Wall Street. The crisis we are entering could be the most challenging since World War II. That is why the Democratic Party must begin to present its alternative vision to Donald Trump’s presidency in one voice.

Were the dynamics of this race different — had Biden performed in a less dominant manner on Tuesday, had Sanders shown a viable path forward over the past three weeks, had the former vice president not turned in his most impressive debate performance on Sunday night — I would argue that this race should go on. But it is now clear that Joe Biden will be his party’s nominee for president.

We heard throughout this long Democratic primary all about the “damn bill” the Vermont senator wrote. He told us all he had done to make the Senate more responsive to the needs of working Americans. If Sanders has that ability to shape the national debate and bend history toward a more just future, then that opportunity is awaiting him on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and not in an empty studio fighting a lost cause by streaming irrelevant campaign speeches.