The Surprising Record Bernie Sanders Just Broke
Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is constantly capturing people's attention — whether he's filibustering on the Senate floor (via Politico), fighting back against Wall Street corruption (via CNN), or simply wearing a coat and mittens on President Joe Biden's Inauguration Day.
It's not an understatement to say that the internet went wild when they saw Senator Sanders wearing a coat by Burton Snowboards, which, according to Syracuse.com, is almost sold out, and a pair of mittens later revealed to be handknit out of recycled wool by Vermont schoolteacher Jen Ellis (via People). The image of Senator Sanders in mittens was circulated far and wide, and of course, even made its way onto merch.
Topps NOW is among those selling memorabilia capturing Sanders' iconic mitten moment, immortalizing the image of him at Inauguration Day with their baseball cards. And after only a week, Topps tweeted that they sold a record 91,169 cards, far surpassing Topps' previous bestselling Dr. Anthony Fauci cards.
In addition, in honor of our current moment, Topps NOW is releasing a set of 12 Garbage Pail Kids cards — available for one week only — representing just about everything going on right now: Bernie Sanders, Reddit vs. Wall Street, Elon Musk, and more.
That's 'Chairman Sanders' now
Senator Sanders jumped on his own bandwagon, so to speak, by using the image of himself at Inauguration Day to sell Chairman Sanders Sweatshirts. The Chairman is, of course, referring to the fact that Senator Sanders is now chairman of the Senate Budget Committee (via Today).
Per Sanders, the first run of sweatshirts sold out in a mere 30 minutes — but there's more merch like T-shirts and stickers on the way. Sales of the sweatshirt have raised $1.8 million for Meals on Wheels Vermont, with certainly more funds on the way.
"Jane and I were amazed by all the creativity shown by so many people over the last week, and we're glad we can use my internet fame to help Vermonters in need," Senator Sanders wrote in a statement (via USA Today). "But even this amount of money is no substitute for action by Congress, and I will be doing everything I can in Washington to make sure working people in Vermont and across the country get the relief they need in the middle of the worst crisis we've faced since the Great Depression."