Vampire Weeknd’s Ezra Koenig explains Bernie Sanders support

Koenig appeared at a Sanders rally in Iowa City on Saturday

Vampire Weekend frontman Ezra Koenig has explained why he is backing Democratic nominee Bernie Sanders in his bid to be US President.

Koenig performed with Dirty Projectors’ Dave Longstreth at a Sanders rally in Iowa City over the weekend. During the rally he spoke to CNN, who asked why he is backing the candidate in the 2016 election.

“A few months ago I just read his book, which he wrote in the ’90s, and just realized that even in the ’90s — which, I was a kid then, Clinton era, it’s easy for me to forget how messed up a lot of things were,” Koenig explained. “And to realize that there was this guy who’s an Independent, criticizing Democrats and Republicans, saying a lot of the same things that he’s saying now. I see a consistency in him that’s rare in most human beings, let alone politicians.

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He continued: “I think there’s something so cool about Bernie running as a Democrat — a guy who was the only Independent in the House for a long time, the only Independent in the Senate, a guy who comes from an outside structure and is bringing that to the Democratic Party. There’s something so much more exciting than somebody who comes from within.”

Koeing was joined by the band’s drummer Chris Thompson, Dirty Projector’s Dave Longstreth and a student a cappella group for the Sanders rally, which took place at the University of Iowa on Saturday (January 30).

The group played two Vampire Weekend songs, ‘Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa’, ‘Unbelievers’, and a rendition of the Woody Guthrie standard ‘This Land is Your Land’ at the ‘Students for Bernie’ campaign event.

Other artists who performed at the rally were LA indie pop group Foster the People, singer-songwriter Jill Sobule, Iowa four-piece Awful Purdies, Letters to Cleo singer Kay Hanley, singer-songwriter Michelle Lewis, comedians the Lucas Brothers, and Hunger Games actor Josh Hutcherson.

Sanders stalwart Killer Mike was also set to perform but cancelled due to a loss in the family. The presidential nomination process will begin today (February 1) when voting opens in Iowa.

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