“During a campaign event yesterday evening, Senator Sanders experienced some chest discomfort,” Jeff Weaver, a longtime adviser to Sanders, said in a statement. “Following medical evaluation and testing he was found to have a blockage in one artery and two stents were successfully inserted. Senator Sanders is conversing and in good spirits. He will be resting up over the next few days. We are canceling his events and appearances until further notice, and we will continue to provide appropriate updates.”
Sanders, 78, was traveling for a gun forum in Las Vegas that other candidates were also scheduled to attend. He was to travel to California later this week.
Weaver read the statement to staffers on a quickly assembled conference call at 10:30 a.m. ET, according to an aide on the call. No one on the staff asked questions following his statement, which the aide said Weaver read in measured tones.
One campaign aide, referring to Sanders, told The Times on Wednesday morning: “He feels better than ever because that’s how people feel after they get a stent and there’s more blood flow.”
Sanders has kept a brutal schedule on the campaign trail, typically holding multiple events in several cities a day. Over the weekend, he held several events at colleges in New Hampshire. Following his trips this week to Nevada and California, he had been expected to travel to Iowa this weekend, according to a campaign aide.
The Sanders campaign had planned to go on air with his first television ads of the campaign this week in Iowa, announcing a two-week $1.3 million buy on Tuesday. An ad tracking service, Medium Buying, said on Wednesday that Sanders began canceling those ads. The reason for the cancellation was not immediately known. Even as late as Tuesday night, Faiz Shakir, Sanders’ campaign manager, was talking excitedly about the ad buy on a call with supporters.
On the trail, Sanders’ events are usually high-energy affairs, where he regales enthusiastic crowds with his calls for “Medicare for All” and tuition-free public college and rails against the corporate and Washington elite. In recent weeks, he has struggled with a hoarse voice that emerged during a swing through Iowa and Colorado and then worsened heading into the last debate in mid-September. He subsequently canceled several events to “rest his voice” but has since returned to the campaign trail.
In March, he hit his head on the edge of a glass shower door, requiring seven stitches.
Sanders has not yet released his medical records though he has vowed to do so. During his first presidential run, he released a letter from his doctor declaring that he was in “very good health.” The letter stated that Sanders had suffered several ailments during his life, including gout, diverticulitis, superficial skin cancers and laryngitis from acid reflux. The letter also said Sanders had normal readings for blood pressure, pulse and blood count and that he had no history of cardiovascular disease.
This article originally appeared in
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