For progressives and supporters of Bernie Sanders, now is not the time to feel defeated. There are still a lot of delegates up for grabs, and the gentleman himself has stated that he fully intends to continue collecting those delegates until the convention in August.

Right now is the time to consider a vote for Bernie as a vote for Medicare for All — along with all the other ideas that Sanders has advocated for these past four years.

You may not believe that the Democratic party can be pushed further in a socially democratic direction. Joe Biden certainly doesn’t give us any reason to believe so.

But we are living in unprecedented times.

A pandemic is gripping the nation, and the state hit hardest thus far has been New York. Remember that folks within the healthcare industry — at least at the grassroots level — have overwhelmingly voiced their support for Bernie Sanders’s Medicare for All proposal.

They are the heroes on the ground who know firsthand where the gaps and inequalities in America’s healthcare system reside, and right now, supporters of the Vermont Senator need to consider a vote for Bernie as a vote for our health care workers and a vote to change a medical system beholden to special interests and that puts profits ahead of public health.

Right now, Bernie Sanders and Pramila Jayapal have drafted emergency legislation calling for the expansion of Medicare to each and every citizen for the duration of the COVID-19 crisis. There is reason to believe — due to concerns over the coronavirus pandemic — that right now, nearly half of all Americans support Medicare for All in one form or another.

This makes it all the more important that we do everything in our power to get Bernie Sanders more delegates for that convention, regardless of his suspended campaign.

Medicare for All has never been more urgent, popular, and feasible than at this moment in history.

We can cave to cynicism and believe that nothing can ever change, or we can vote like we otherwise would have, and find out for ourselves just how much of a difference we can make.

Why not listen to Bernie on this one? Why not vote for him in the remaining primaries anyway?

Even if the chance that he can stage a comeback against presumptive nominee Joe Biden is a slim one, the more votes — and by extension delegates — that Bernie receives, the more evidence there will be for the feasibility of his policies and the notion that the majority of Americans would like the nation to move in a socially democratic direction.

Thinking beyond the 2020 election, the struggle for Medicare for All will continue — with or without a willing Democratic party or a Joe Biden open to budging.

It may feel as if there is no reason left to vote with the announcement of Bernie’s suspended campaign, but think of what your vote can accomplish when it comes to joining your voice with others in support of Bernie’s ideas, which have undeniably been the primary reason progressives have supported his bid for the presidency since the beginning?

A vote result is essentially a poll, and far better than the ones conducted via the phone or online. By that metric, Bernie’s ideas came second place to every other contestant in the field. Millions of people came out in support of Bernie’s platform, and millions more have yet to vote.

We can support them in making their political will felt and heard, or we can abandon them because we don’t like the word “suspended.”

The narrative being painted by establishment media outlets and partisan Democrats is that Bernie Sanders failed to make a difference in American politics.

This is an attempt to dissuade progressives from feeling like they have a voice going forward, to get them to fall in line, and to stop the pursuit of a fairer, more equitable America.

The truth is that Bernie Sanders has made a difference, but it is up to us to continue the fight for the policies he helped popularize in the public consciousness.

As of right now, the next primary being held in the Democratic contest is in Ohio, on Tuesday, April 28th. There are 136 pledged delegates up for grabs — roughly 43% of the delegate difference between Bernie and Biden, currently.

Let’s raise awareness about the need for folks in Ohio to mail in their ballots in support of Bernie Sanders and Medicare for All. Let’s show them that they can still make a difference going forward and that their votes — and their voices — still matter.

They still have a little over two weeks to make their votes count!

Remember, Bernie wants us to help him get delegates for that convention, so why not help him out with that?