The Vermont senator denounced the existence of superdelegates, many of whom announced their support for Clinton before any voting had begun, as "absurd and undemocratic." | AP Sanders rips Clinton's 'arrogance,' vows to beat Trump 'bad'

Bernie Sanders tore into Hillary Clinton's presumption that she is going to be the Democratic nominee for president late Thursday night, taking to the stage of ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live" while sarcastically thanking Donald Trump for appearing to be concerned about his situation in the primary.

At one point in the sit-down, Kimmel played a clip from Clinton's May 19 interview with CNN's Chris Cuomo in which she declared, "I will be the nominee for my party, Chris. That is already done, in effect. There's no way that I won't be."


"Whoa..." Sanders said, shifting in his chair.

"Does that make you mad seeing that?" Kimmel queried.

Sanders remarked, "Just a tinge of arrogance there, I think."

Kimmel and the audience laughed.

"You know, unfortunately the people of Indiana a couple of weeks ago, the people of West Virginia, the people of Oregon who gave us a pretty good victory don't quite agree with Secretary Clinton's assessment," Sanders continued, ticking through his recent primary victories. "And we split Kentucky, and I kind of think on June 7th, the people of California will have a message for Secretary Clinton: Don't count your chickens."

The Vermont senator remarked that he would have to do "really, really well" in California in order to make a significant dent in Clinton's delegate lead, denouncing the existence of superdelegates, many of whom announced their support for Clinton before any voting had begun, as "absurd and undemocratic."

"And kind of dumb in the sense that when you make that judgment, you want to know how the campaign is going," he continued. "Who is the strongest candidate? It turns out that in virtually every single national poll, and in every single state poll, Bernie Sanders does often, a lot better against Donald Trump than does Hillary Clinton."

Trump, meanwhile, posed his own question for Sanders a night after the Democratic candidate did the same, asking the Manhattan media mogul if he would be willing to debate, touching off a day of frenzied speculation and stakes-setting. The question: "Will you run as an independent when the party bosses steal this nomination away from you?"

"I think there's a little bit of self-service there for Donald Trump," Sanders said, though he didn't explicitly rule out the idea.

"I don't think so. He's not like that," Kimmel joked.

Kimmel commented that Trump told him Wednesday night that the primary quarrel between Sanders and Clinton is "upsetting him."

"Mr. Trump, I appreciate his concern for me. I know that comes straight from his heart. But tell him that what I hope will happen is that, in fact, I will run against him as the Democratic nominee for president of the United States, and if I do, we're going to beat him and beat him bad," Sanders declared. "You can tell him that."