Sanders: 'Messy' convention comments were taken out of context

Bernie Sanders on Tuesday attempted to clarify comments he had previously made that seemed to predict the Democratic convention in Philadelphia this summer would be “messy.”

Sanders told NBC that comments he had made in an interview with the Associated Press were taken out of context. He said it wasn’t a threat of any sort — democracy in general is messy.

“The media often takes words out of context. The context of that is democracy is messy, that people will have a vigorous debate on the issues,” the Vermont senator said.

“Will the convention be messy?” NBC's Kristen Welker asked.

“Well, of course it will be. But everything — that’s what democracy is all about,” Sanders said.

In the Associated Press story, when asked whether the convention could be “problematical,” Sanders responded: "So what? Democracy is messy.”

“Everyday my life is messy. But if you want everything to be quiet and orderly and allow, you know, just things to proceed without vigorous debate, that is not what democracy is about,” he added.

Also in the NBC interview Tuesday, Sanders was asked (as he often is these days) whether he’s hurting former secretary of State Hillary Clinton by staying in the race. Clinton holds a significant lead with both pledged and superdelegates and is looking more and more like the Democratic nominee.

"Well, I guess if we take your assumption and Clinton supporters' assumption to the logical conclusion, you know what we should do? We should go back to a monarchy, and not have any elections at all,” Sanders shot back.