To the editor:

I was at a Bernie Sanders rally Sunday, Dec. 13, in Mount Vernon. There were close to 2,000 people in a town of 3,000 and it was not even covered by the Cedar Rapids Gazette, which is the largest circulation newspaper in this area. Not one paragraph. I could not believe it when I opened the paper Monday, Dec. 14. It was a huge event. Not even a paragraph!

Yet The Gazette did cover a Hillary Clinton organizer meeting of 10 people with a large color photo. An event in which an actor presided — Hillary not even there. That Bernie Sanders is being ignored by mainstream media should be a subject of growing concern to anyone who values the role of the third estate in defending democracy. To ignore the populist appeal of Sanders is in fact bad business for a newspaper that values its readership.

Thomas Simon

Mount Vernon

Editor’s Note: It’s extremely common for candidates to schedule multiple events in a short period in our coverage area. This was the case with Bernie Sanders’ visit earlier this month. We made the decision to cover him in Anamosa, but did not cover his appearance in Mount Vernon the following day. Because of the number of candidates, size of The Gazette’s circulation area and frequency of visits by political candidates, we must select which visits we cover. Often times we’re covering one, but not multiple appearances during their visits. We are making these decisions on a variety of factors which include location in coverage area, venue, staff availability (we often have multiple candidates in our area at the same time), whether the candidate or someone is speaking on their behalf.