Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders Launches Twitch Channel

Bernie Sanders, Vermont senator and 2020 U.S. presidential candidate, has launched his own Twitch channel. The decision serves as the latest move in his digital campaign which has already experienced success in courting the attention of young voters.

Sanders' channel has amassed over 11,000 followers and continues to grow. Sorted under Twitch's "Just Chatting" category, the feed won't include any epic duos or celebrity match-ups. Instead, the team will focus on delivering fresh political content in a recurring format. This "Bernie TV" style will include live streams of Sanders and his staffers providing campaign updates and discussing the latest news.

"We're moving toward doing a lot more live content on Twitch, YouTube, and Facebook, tapping into an audience where there's not a lot of political content already," said Josh Miller-Lewis, the digital communications director behind Sanders' campaign. The team will air a pre- and post-show surrounding tomorrow's Democratic debates before moving to a more regular schedule.

Many of the presidential candidates have an active social media presence; however, Sanders is the first to tap into the Twitch craze. The impact of this strategy remains up in the air; it will be interesting to see if other political figures take a page from his book and join the platform.

Sanders continues to make waves in the video game world. Last week, the senator took to social media with a call for the video game industry to unionize. "The video game industry made $43 billion in revenue last year," Sanders tweeted. "The workers responsible for that profit deserve to collectively bargain as part of a union." The message included a link to a Time article detailing the industry's prevailing mistreatment of game developers.

Whatever your stance on Twitch streamers and unionization, Sanders is one of the first politicians to tap into the pulse of the video game scene. If the trend continues, you can expect more out-of-the-box moves from the candidate and his team in the future.