Presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders is using social media to engage with his young supporters in a way that Hillary Clinton’s campaign can only dream of.

During the second Republican presidential primary debate last week, Sanders raised some eyebrows and “threw some shade” in a series of live tweets.

“Trump. What a pleasant and humble person. Can’t stop saying kind and generous things about his fellow Republicans,” Sanders tweeted last Wednesday night.

Almost all of his tweets were signed with the hashtag #DebateWithBernie, garnering thousands of shares and favorites while opening up a discussion with both voters and the GOP.

Not only is Sanders presenting himself in a personable way on screens across the nation, but live-tweeting the Republican debates also allows the American people to focus on the Vermont senator.

When Sanders became the most talked about candidate of an opposing party’s debate, he rallied voters back from the red side of the spectrum to the socialist camp.

Political debates are generally an opportunity for less popular candidates to shine, which can often change the focus of the election. But Sanders managed to steal even that spotlight from the GOP – this time, on Facebook.

“The evening was really pretty sad,” Sanders wrote. “This country and our planet face enormous problems. And the Republican candidates barely touched upon them tonight. And when they did, they were dead wrong on virtually every position they took. The Republican Party cannot be allowed to lead this country. That’s why we need a political revolution.”

It was the most popular Facebook post of the night, with over 176,000 likes and 35,000 shares. Second place was a post by retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson that amassed over 128,000 likes and 8,700 shares.

By the next day, headlines appeared across the Internet stating, rather than naming a Republican winner, that Sanders came out on top.

But where was Hillary Clinton? The former Secretary of State attended a private fundraiser on Long Island and did not watch the debate. Her absence shouldn’t be surprising, considering that during the first GOP debate, Clinton gained two celebrity endorsements and a selfie with Kim Kardashian and Kanye West.

When she is already criticized for being out of touch, Clinton continues to miss out on reaching younger voters. Comparatively, Sanders emerges as a candidate who engages with his voter base and invests himself in the election.

In fact, millennials seem to like the senator more than Clinton, who was upstaged by Sanders at the same university in New Hampshire on Sunday. Two days after Clinton addressed the University of New Hampshire, Sanders waltzed into Durham, New Hampshire, and drew five times more people than the former secretary of state.

Despite all this, a CNN and ORC International post-debate poll revealed that Clinton has increased her lead over Sanders, gaining five points while Sanders dropped the same number. This is Clinton’s first rise in the polls since her dubbed “summer slump,” where she repeatedly dipped to her socialist competition.

The Sanders debate tweets did not yield an immediate effect in the polls, but social media users are positively responding to Sanders’ messages. This method of connecting with a younger audience will only be helpful for the Vermont senator who still has months to go before Iowa and has yet to face off against Clinton on the debate stage.

In the meantime, his tweets remind voters why they like Sanders, and leave them asking why Hillary Clinton is not tuning in.

Keely Sullivan is a senior broadcast and digital journalism and French dual major. Her column appears weekly. She can be reached at kasull02@syr.edu and followed on Twitter @specialksully.

Published on September 24, 2015 at 12:02 am