During a televised debate, Rep. Raul Labrador went after his Democratic challenger, James Piotrowski, saying, “He’s not a moderate,” and reading a tweet that Piotrowski sent from his personal Twitter account in February: “@BernieSanders this tweet cost you the vote of this lifelong progressive, labor activist and socialist. This was beneath you.” The tweet was posted at 7 p.m. Feb. 3, 2016. It’s since been deleted.

Piotrowski’s tweet was in apparent response to a Sanders tweet the same day that was sharply critical of rival Hillary Clinton, including an image of a list of complaints about Clinton’s record, opening with, “Pleads guilty to being moderate and center. Has a Wall Street-funded SuperPAC. Promoted fracking. Opposes Medicare-for-all and says a single-payer system will never ever happen.”

Piotrowski told Eye on Boise that he’s not a socialist, but he described himself as one in the tweet to make a point to supporters of then-presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders, a self-described socialist.

“I’ve been called a socialist more times than you could imagine because of the legal work I do,” Piotrowski said, including representing labor unions. “So when I tweeted that out to Sanders supporters, it was trying to identify that I’m one of those folks that have been in the trenches, I’ve been called a socialist, I’ve been called an activist, I’ve been called a lot worse.”

After last week’s debate, the Idaho Republican Party tweeted a screenshot of the Piotrowski tweet, adding this comment: “We’ll just leave this here. So much for ‘moderate’ or ‘reasonable’ @IdahoDems.”