Hillary Clinton is finally campaigning in Iowa but at least one other potential Democratic rival is making contact with activists in the early caucus state as well.



Vermont senator Bernie Sanders is holding a conference call with Iowa Democrats on Thursday night. In an email obtained by the Guardian, Phil Fiermonte, a political aide to Sanders, wrote: “This would be for Bernie to update people about his presidential race decision making and for him to hear from you.”

Although the initial email described the call as tentative, simply saying “Bernie is thinking about organizing a conference call with a number of leaders in Iowa who we have met this past year,” Fiermonte confirmed that the call was happening. He said that Sanders “wants to hear from [Iowans] about what they are thinking and hearing and seeing on the ground”.

Sanders, a self-described socialist, has long been pondering a run for the Democratic nomination despite being an independent. (He does caucus with the Democrats on Capitol Hill, voting with them and is considered a Democrat in terms of seniority and committee membership.) Sanders has made several trips to Iowa and New Hampshire in the past year and has been courting liberal activists in those crucial states, the first and second to choose their Democratic presidential candidate in 2016.

Sanders’s conference call is scheduled to occur just after Clinton’s campaign swing through the state ends and will give the senator an opportunity to gauge how Iowa liberals have reacted to the former secretary of state’s widely publicized trip.

Sanders has not hesitated to criticize Clinton in the past and, on Wednesday, told reporters from Bloomberg that he did not believe she was “prepared to take on the billionaire class”.

Clinton has taken steps to reach out to disaffected liberals already in the course of her young campaign. She indicated on Tuesday that she might be willing to support a constitutional amendment to achieve campaign finance reform and emphasized other progressive priorities as well, including Obamacare, equal pay for women, and immigration reform. Clinton has long been viewed skeptically on the left of the Democratic party because of her support of the Iraq war and ties to Wall Street.

