Not in those four states he wasn't. Assessing solely those four states by aggregate numbers by extrapolating their total independent populations using the easiest reference I have at hand,
via the Pew, weighted by those exit polls, Biden enjoys 3,893K vs. Bernie's 3,572K independent supporters in sum across those states, translating to a 52% vs. 48% absolute advantage.
Sanders won independent voters in 3 out of those 4 states. He won the independent vote in every state other than a few deep red southern states and Florida, which was a closed primary. Did you extrapolate that?
Media bias in the Democratic primary
The above is a deep dive into media coverage of the primary written in November of last year. The candidates who received the most disproportionate coverage relative to their overall popularity in the polls to that point?
Gillibrand, De Blasio, Warren, Steyer, and Booker.
The most underrepresented?
Hickenlooper, Yang, and O'Rourke.
Marry that to the above analysis of the tone of coverage, and you can see that Biden was actually getting slammed-- with unrivaled volume-- by the press, not the contrary.
You consistently assume these victimization fantasies at odds with reality. It's like a mild form of schizophrenia.
You didn't answer the question and the author of your article actually concludes there is evidence for bias against Gabbard and Sanders.
Your link is also from last year when the worst bias against Sanders I've seen was from this year when the race kicked off.
"In the 24 hours following his massive win in Nevada, Sanders received 3.26 times the proportion of negative CNN coverage than Biden did following the latter’s South Carolina win—despite the two wins being by similar margins."
http://inthesetimes.com/article/223...iden-media-spin-candidates-negative-mentions/
It's not just negative mentions either, it's the nastiness of them. Here's just a small sample of the negative comments made on NBC about Sanders:
"Bernie Sanders makes my skin crawl"
"I see him as a not pro woman candidate"
"I don't understand young women who support him"
“I don’t care how many people from the island of misfit black girls you throw out there to defend you"
"I do find it fascinating that racist liberal whites seem to love them some Bernie Sanders"
"I was reading last night about the fall of France in the summer of 1940. And the general, Reynaud, calls up Churchill and says, 'It's over.' And Churchill says: 'How can that be? You've got the greatest army in Europe. How can it be over?' He said, 'It's over.' So I had that suppressed feeling."
"No other candidate has anything like this digital brownshirt brigade"
"I have an attitude towards Castro. I believe if Castro and the Reds had won the Cold War there would have been executions in Central Park, and I might have been one of the ones getting executed. And certain other people would be there cheering, OK?"
"The only thing between the United States and the abyss is the Democratic Party. That’s it. If we go the way of the British Labour Party, if we nominate Jeremy Corbyn, it’s going to be the end of days."
When Biden has been criticized by the MSM it isn't anywhere near as nasty as this. They won't even report on his sexual assault allegation.