A reporter asked Bernie Sanders about Hillary Clinton's hair. His reply: 'Do you have serious questions?'

(Image credit: Win McNamee/Getty Images)

published 17 August 2015

There's one topic that Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) refuses to discuss: Hillary Clinton's hair. When a New York Times reporter asked Sanders in a Q&A, "Do you think it's fair that Hillary's hair gets a lot more scrutiny than yours does?," Sanders had to repeat the question a few times to wrap his head around what he was supposed to be responding to.

He then told the reporter: "Okay, Ana, I don't mean to be rude here. I am running for president of the United States on serious issues, okay? Do you have serious questions?"

The reporter responded that her question about Hillary's hair was, in fact, a serious question due to the "gendered reason" for the media focusing more on female candidates' appearances. But Sanders just couldn't understand the concern for something as trivial as hair. "When the media worries about what Hillary's hair looks like or what my hair looks like, that's a real problem," he said. "We have millions of people who are struggling to keep their heads above water, who want to know what candidates can do to improve their lives, and the media will very often spend more time worrying about hair than the fact that we're the only major country on Earth that doesn't guarantee health care to all people."