Sanders fans aren't going quietly

A storm descended on Philadelphia, indoors and outdoors, during the first night of the Democratic National Convention.

The intensity of the weather bearing down on the city Monday was reflected in A.J. Konda’s cellphone connection which intermittently broke up as the North Idaho College student talked about the mood among delegates in Wells Fargo Center.

“There’s a lot of political dissonance here, some healthy and some not,” Konda said. “It’s definitely energized.”

Meanwhile, outside the convention center, city officials were urging protesters in a park across the street to seek shelter from the thunder, lightning and heavy rain.

Konda, of Coeur d’Alene, a Sanders delegate and the only delegate in attendance from Kootenai County, said friction between the Sanders and Clinton camps was palpable inside the center.

“Almost any time a keynote speaker says we need to unify with Hillary, there is booing from the Sanders delegates,” Konda said.

Earlier in the day, Sanders himself spoke with his delegates. The Vermont senator did not explicitly ask them to vote for Clinton, Konda said, but Sanders did say they should unite behind her to beat Donald Trump.

“Even his own delegation booed him a bit,” Konda said.

Many people are angry about the leaked emails that suggest the party worked to undermine the Sanders campaign, Konda said. But they’re happy Debbie Wasserman Shultz resigned from her position as chair of the Democratic National Party.

Konda thinks it’s a political strategy designed to mitigate the negative fallout from the new email scandal. He noted that historically, a new head of the DNC is named after a presidential nomination anyway.

“It’s interesting that within 24 hours she’s been given a high position with the Clinton campaign,” he said.

For those hoping Sanders could still win the nomination, Konda admits it’s a stretch.

“It’s quite a margin to go against,” he said, noting that more than 800 delegates would have to be swayed for a Sanders nomination. He said it would take “something crazy” and he expected a lot of chanting during Elizabeth Warren’s speech.

“But not a lot has progressed right now,” Konda said.

By early Monday evening, he said they had listened to multiple keynote speakers who were not, for the most part, talking about Clinton.

“They’re all talking about Trump, how we need to elect Hillary because of Trump,” Konda said.