Bernie Sanders entered this election’s Democratic Primary as the outsider. His support has stemmed from grassroots campaigns. He had rallies with five-figure attendance. College students quickly pledged allegiance. “Bernie 2016” bumper stickers started popping up like wildflowers (or weeds, depending on your ideology).

However, he hasn’t surpassed front-runner Hillary Clinton. Despite his anti-establishment appeal, Clinton is not heavily threatened. Now, I am certainly not a democratic strategist. Nor do Clinton or Sanders’ messages appeal to me. However, there are some pretty clear reasons why Clinton is winning this cycle:

Debates

It was widely agreed by both sides of the aisle that Hillary Clinton won the first democratic debate. The forum in South Carolina still has the jury out at the time of this writing, but the consensus appears to be that Clinton won again. In addition to losing to Clinton, Martin O’Malley is beginning to take shots at Sanders. While it is unlikely that O’Malley will move up the rankings significantly, his attacks weaken Sanders again Clinton.

Immigration

As U.S. Senator for Vermont, Sanders voted against sweeping immigration reform in 2007, saying, “we need millions of people to be coming into this country as guest workers who will work for lower wages than American workers and drive wages down even lower than they are right now. He campaigned in Vermont as wanting to protect local workers from against immigration. He is opposed the Hispanic Chamber Commerce after he claimed that open borders were apparently a right ideal (how he thought that is troubling). Now, Sanders has argued he will come out with an immigration plan to enhance DREAMers, however that won’t change his record.

Minorities

Clinton is winning minorities. She knows it. Sanders knows it. Political pundits know it. Part of this for African American voters, is a lack of name recognition. Clinton is polling at 80% for this community according to the gallup poll. For Hispanic voters, his immigration record (see above) poses an uphill climb. Sanders won his election to senate in Vermont, where 95% of the population is Caucasian, it is no wonder he didn’t start with a minority base.

Foreign Policy

In several ways, this is one of Clinton’s weakest areas. All Sanders needs to do is formulate a policy, and attack Clinton on her past positions during a debate. However, he hasn’t done that. Instead, he has appeared unprepared at the worst and status quo at the best. Sanders has attacked the Iraq War in the past but refuses to publically call out Clinton. If he keeps waiting, he will keep losing.

Socialism

Americans aren’t socialist, on either side of the aisle. Whether capitalism is working for you or not, the large majority of American’s value capitalism. In order to win as a self-proclaimed socialist, Sanders would have to give a lecture on what socialism is and explain its benefits to 51% of the nation. An election is not the time to do that. All it takes is a couple of TV commercials highlighting how in socialist nations, the middle class is not better off (see Denmark’s 60% tax on the middle class). Now, maybe you are an academic, maybe you can debate that statement. That is fine. However, it isn’t going to resonate well with the majority of Americans.

This article isn’t exclusive, I am sure that there are many other reasons why Bernie Sanders just isn’t toppling Hillary Clinton. Many of the former problems are fixable, but some would require him changing who he is — and he probably isn't ready to do that.