By now you must have seen one of the thousands of memes showing a man sitting on a chair waiting, but who is this man and why has he gone viral?
Bernie Sanders is a 79 year old American Politician who went viral after attending Joe Biden’s inauguration, but what did Bernie do to get all this attention? He decided to wear a parka jacket, knitted mittens, and a classic bright blue face mask. Many accused Bernie of ‘snubbing’ the occasion through his decision to dress casually at the formal event.
The internet soon caught on to his fashion choices, and have since been photoshopping Bernie in various places across the world, with a few more imaginative memes showing him on rollercoasters or in the Game Of Thrones chair.
Memes have also been created of the ‘Bernie Starter Pack’ and ‘Steal his look’, suggesting that to be like him all you need is a pair of knitted mittens, a disposable face mask, a parka coat, and a fold-up chair.
Bernie has become so popular that you can now also buy mittens and face masks with his face on, or even a mini crotchet doll of him!
But before he received all this media attention, Bernie was busy with his political career, which officially began in 1971 when he became a member of the Liberty Union Party. He ran as the parties candidate for Governor of Vermont in 1972 but lost the election, and lost his second run in 1976 as well.
He soon resigned from the party and in 1980 announced he would be running for Mayor of Burlington, Vermont, an election which he won. Bernie remained in office from 1981 until 1989 when he decided he had been Mayor long enough.
In 1991 Bernie won a seat in the US senate as a Vermont Representative, and he was the first independent elected into the House of Representatives since 1951. He remained in the house until 2007 and achieved numerous things during this time.
Since then Bernie has continued to work in politics, and from 2013-2015 he was Chair of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee. Then most recently he became Chair on the Senate Budget Committee during February 2021.
