Folks the reason why no one blamed Bernie Sanders for what happened to Scalise is because:

[kpete]

Sanders never targeted Scalise for hate speech, he never celebrated physical violence against a reporter, he never called the press the enemy of the people, and on and on. No comparison.

Link to tweet

[mucifer]

1. Plus he denounced it publicly and very clearly as soon as he heard about it

[kentuck]

2. Absolutely needs to be said.

Bernie Sanders never acted like Donald Trump or said the language that Donald Trump chooses to use.

The shooter was angry at Republicans because of what Republicans did, not because of what Bernie Sanders said.

[Iterate]

3. Trump named the targets.

At this time, Sayoc doesn't seem to ever have had an original thought. He couldn't even spell the names correctly, but he had heard them. And when Trump called for violence at his rallies, he was always calling for some one else to do the deed.

Sanders did no such thing, and certainly didn't spend six years calling out named enemies. The same can be said for any Democrat. Even when Biden or DeNiro challenged Trump (as one would do with a schoolyard bully), it was one-on-one and said in a mocking way. No equivalence.

[Tom Rinaldo]

4. Not to mention that Bernie was talking about real consequences of denying health care to millions

People get ill, they can't afford medical treatments, they die. It isn't complicated. It is called a policy debate.

[joshcryer]

5. Yeah, but then there was this stuff:

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

[Hortensis]

6. Well, yes, politicians who run as "reform" candidates

against mainstream candidates always do have to appeal to populist resentments by badmouthing their mainstream opponents. It's a hoary old strategy. After all, how else could a hopeful candidate rejected by colleagues and funders hope to displace the favorites? And some of the voters drawn to that always become way too enthusiastically hostile and irrational, leading a few to act out. That's as inevitable as that negative campaigns gather speed on downhill runs.

But that's beside the OP's point, which is spot on. Sanders had nothing to do with the shooting of a Republican whip most people didn't know existed. Sanders' primary focus was necessarily on the Democratic Party, and during the primary he never tried to focus his followers' passions to the right, and certainly not on a relatively obscure figure like Scalise.

Extremely unlike the list of targets Trump offers his whackadoodles.

[joshcryer]

8. Well...

...I wanted Sanders to denounce that crap, and to denounce the Planned Parenthood boycotts, etc. I felt it was coming from the campaign.

But maybe politicians like that sincerely think they're correct and that they have nothing to do with it?

[The Liberal Lion]

7. Yeah, I thought the equivocation was nothing short of absurd.

If anything Bernie is always preaching a message of tolerance, acceptance and inclusion. He barley has a bad word to say about trump and his new nazi party. He mainly sticks to policy criticism, as it should be. As a matter of fact, sometimes I wish Bernie would take a harder line, but that's just me.