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- [00:00]
A
You have been ahead of the curve on so many of these issues for so long. Increasing the minimum wage, free tuition, LGBTQ rights. You've been talking about universal health care since Star A New Hope was in theaters in 1978. Essentially, what you've been doing for the past 40 years is just doing what I do with my kids. Put on your shoes. Hey. Put your shoes on. Stop. Put your shoes on. Put your shoes on. Put. Please, for the love of God, put your shoes on.
- [00:27]
B
Whether healthcare is a right of all of its people, that health care is a right of all people. Health care is a right of all people. Health care is a right of all people. Healthcare is a right of all people.
- [00:41]
A
You've been saying, put your shoes on for the past 40 years. Senator Sanders, do you ever feel like blowing your brains out? Occasionally, because my daughter is in the first grade. She hasn't even gotten to the first grade, and I.
- [00:54]
B
Sounds like you feel like blowing your brains out daily.
- [00:57]
A
Senator Sanders.
- [00:58]
B
Oh, don't do it. It's not. It's not the solution to the problem. Look.
- [01:06]
A
Ladies and gentlemen, Senator Bernie Sanders. Yeah.
- [01:10]
B
There's almost as many people that were here as there were last night.
- [01:15]
A
Senator Sanders, do you need a little.
- [01:18]
B
Hello, Jane. How's my hair?
- [01:19]
A
Jane?
- [01:20]
B
Oh, you are.
- [01:20]
A
Yes, I'm. You know, there's a barbershop over there. We gotta get you.
- [01:26]
B
No, no.
- [01:26]
A
We can get you, too.
- [01:27]
B
I'm not kidding.
- [01:28]
A
I'm not kidding. This is true love. This is real love. This is.
- [01:31]
B
Sanders.
- [01:32]
A
This is real love. Senator Bernie Sanders. Thank you so much.
- [01:35]
B
My pleasure.
- [01:35]
A
I want to start by exposing a secret about you. I know this is gonna be a little intense, but it's gonna shock the conscience of the American public. Senator Sanders, how tall are you?
- [01:47]
B
Six feet. Television makes you short and fat. And for some reason, no matter how I sit, I look fatter than I am. I'm not that fat, folks. You're not fat. But I am. Six feet.
- [01:57]
A
I'm not fat. Shaming you. But there is this notion that you're a short king, but you are a tall comrade.
- [02:03]
B
Now that we've gotten through the important stuff. All right, let's get to it.
- [02:07]
A
Let's get to the real stuff. As someone who has covered the DNC for a long time, I've been there. It's felt electric in a way that I haven't felt in a long time. But I'm also seeing Democratic Party leadership in solidarity like I've never seen before. There's no sneak dissing. There is no disorder there's no infighting, progressives and neoliberals, arm in arm. Senator Sanders, we had yourself, AOC and JB Pritzker, a billionaire, all on stage together. So my question to you is, are we witnessing the rise of a more unified Democratic Party, or is this a Donald J. Trump is an existential threat one off?
- [02:45]
B
Well, it depends. I don't know that we know the answer to that. What I think we do know, which is clear, is that Donald Trump is the most dangerous candidate in perhaps the history of this country. And it's not only because of his terrible positions and all of the issues that I'm sure your listeners and viewers are familiar with. It is, he is an authoritarian personality and will move this country in an authoritarian direction, the likes of which, you know, I think it's hard to appreciate. So it's extremely dangerous. And I think what that reality has done is brought a whole lot of people to say, hey, you know what, we gotta defeat this guy. We have to elect Kamala and Tim to the administration. And we go from there.
- [03:32]
A
Are progressives and liberals, in your opinion, because of this existential threat, finally learning how to work together because, well, things were.
- [03:38]
B
That's a complicated, complicated question. I think what you have, and it's the idea of coalition politics is something that we're not familiar with in the United States. It exists in Europe, all over the place. It did recently in France, as you may be familiar with, there was a threat of a right wing movement, Le Pen, similar to Trumpism, and the left, including moderates and center left and further left, people came together and said, you know, we can't allow this to happen in France. So right now we are united in an honest way to defeat Donald Trump. But do not minimize the differences that exist between progressives and corporate Democrats.
- [04:16]
A
In your speech at the convention, you said that you wanted a ceasefire in Gaza.
- [04:20]
B
We must end this horrific war in Gaza, bring home the hostages and demand an immediate ceasefire.
- [04:37]
A
Huge applause break moment in the united center. It was pretty amazing. Everyone cheered. It really was a moment. But I want to talk about that word ceasefire. It means something very different for different people. The meaning of that word seems to be changing in real time. Senator Sanders, what is your definition of the word ceasefire?
- [04:57]
B
If you allow me, let me back it up a little bit. Sure. I'll get there. Okay.
- [05:00]
A
And it's just walking us through.
- [05:01]
B
Yeah. Okay, let's. Let's go through with what happened on October 7. Hamas, which is a terrorist organization, invaded Israel and killed 1200 innocent men, women and children took 200 hostages. They are a terrorist organization. Bad news, guys. Israel responded as any government would respond to an attack like that. Israel had the right to defend itself. But what has happened since then is rather than just go after Hamas, a terrorist organization, with Israel under an extreme right wing government led by Benjamin Netanyahu, who has in his cabinet people to the right of him who are out and out, anti Palestinian, racist, no ifs, buts and masks. These are racist. So this is the cabinet. What they have done is say, hey, we're not just going to go after Hamas, we're going to go after the Palestinian people. And the carnage has been horrific and we are looking at the worst humanitarian disaster, one of the worst in modern history. And I've been on the floor talking about this a whole lot. So it's not just. Not just 30,000. They got a population there in Gaza, 2.2 million, 30,000 dead, mostly women, children and the elderly. Over 80,000 injured. Mostly women, children and the elderly. Yes. You got 1.8 million people, three quarters of the population displaced. You got it taken out of your home. Yeah. Oh, and then you moved again. And then you moved again. And it's a young population, a lot of children. Okay. You got 65% of the housing damaged or destroyed. Got that. So we don't know where these people are going to go back to. There are 12 universities in Gaza. Guess what? Every single one of them has been bombed. They had a fairly decent healthcare system, systematically destroyed, very few functioning hospitals. Right now you got no electricity in Gaza right now. And then, as a result of Israel's efforts to deny humanitarian aid, to block humanitarian aid, you're now looking at the possibility of mass starvation. And children right now are malnourished. And when you're a child malnourished, that's permanent. I mean, you may not necessarily die. It'll impact your intellectual development and your emotional. So you got a horror show. Now, what bothers me, I would hope that that bothers anybody, of course. But what is even worse is a lot of this is being done with US Taxpayer dollars. So what I have insisted on from day one, and one of the few, is to say, you know what? Not another nickel to Netanyahu's extremist government to continue the war against the Palestinian people. Our new position must be simple and straightforward. Not another nickel for the Netanyahu government. If their present policies continue as we speak, there's more military aid going to Netanyahu, and I'm going to do my best to block it. Do I think we'll win. No, but there is a provision that you have to block that kind of military aid and I will do my best to block it.
- [08:09]
A
As I read and internalize the news, they're giving me these updates on the negotiations and it feels almost like the itunes user agreement where it's we all want to cease fire, but ceasefire if. Cease fire. But help me understand that.
- [08:21]
B
Is it a condition or an unconscious? I mean, look, you're asking a very fair question. Okay. And it's just not. I have not been involved day to day ceasefires. So it's a good question. Don't know the answer. All that I do know.
- [08:32]
A
Can you help me frame this?
- [08:33]
B
Sure. If you're Hamas. Right. What do you want? You want. If you want a ceasefire, which I suspect they may want it, you want to protect your interest as best you can. If you're Israel, you want to minimize or diminish Hamas to the degree you can. So I suspect within that framework, that's what these discussions are about.
- [08:52]
A
Do you feel the US has a role as a neutral broker between these two sides?
- [08:55]
B
US is not a neutral broker. US is significantly supporting the Netanyahu government. Not neutral, but I think. And what we, you know, we focus rightfully so on Gaza. But I hope everybody understands there's another part, there's the west bank where you're seeing unprecedented vigilantism against Palestinian landowners and homeowners as well. So look, the role that the United States can play is Israel has been dependent on U.S. financial support and military support for a long time. And what we have got to say to them, if you want another nickel, sorry, this is the way it's going to be. At the very least, there's going to be a Palestinian state. Palestinian people need their own political and economic entity and we are not going to be providing you any more weapons so long as you are going to war against the Palestinian people.
- [09:51]
A
You're obviously in the Senate. Let's talk about the House. Back in April, there was a bill to approve billions in military aid for Israel that went through Congress. Out of the roughly 200 House Democrats, only 37 voted against military aid. So just so folks understand, kind of the way the voting works, over 80% of House Democrats and virtually all Republicans.
- [10:13]
B
I would imagine, correct? Yeah.
- [10:15]
A
Were good on sending.
- [10:17]
B
Yeah.
- [10:17]
A
Okay. Yesterday I was at the United center, you say the word ceasefire, incredible applause break. So what I'm hearing at the convention is from the Democratic Party is yay, ceasefire. And simultaneously from 80% of those members of Congress, I'M also hearing, yay, weapons.
- [10:35]
B
The convention is, you know, thousands of people. It's a small number of people.
- [10:40]
A
Right.
- [10:41]
B
If you do polling today, I think if you ask a simple question and you say, do you think your taxpayer. American, taxpayer dollars should go to support the Netanyahu government and their continuation of the war, I suspect a pretty strong majority of Americans would say, no, I don't. And among Democrats, the numbers would be very high. So if your question is, is Congress, I think your question is reflecting where the American people are at.
- [11:07]
A
Correct.
- [11:07]
B
The answer is, no, they're not.
- [11:09]
A
Why is that?
- [11:10]
B
Well, it is the same answer that I would give you. If you ask me, gee, how come every other major country on earth has health care as a human right and we don't? And polls show that the majority of the American people want health care as a human right. How come we don't tax billionaires at a higher rate when the American people think we should? And the answer to all of those questions is the same. And I tried to talk about that a little bit last night. It is the role of money in politics. So right now, both major political parties, Democrats and Republicans, are funded very heavily by the wealthiest people in this country. And if you were a billionaire and you wanted to slaughter super pac, you could put hundreds of millions of dollars into campaigns to defeat people who opposed you and to support your friends who will Support your agenda.
- [12:01]
A
Two out of those 37 House members that voted against the weapons bill were Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush. They recently lost their primaries. Why did they lose their primaries?
- [12:10]
B
Well, that's good. And they lost their primaries because a super pac, aipac, put an unprecedented amount of money. I was involved in both of their campaigns. Jamal's more than Corey's. But we helped Cory raise money. And the reason is the billionaire class does not want strong opposition to the billionaire agenda. And in Jamal, you had somebody who was strongly opposed to it. And it's not just on Israel, where his views were not probably dissimilar to mine or Corey's, but on other issues as well. So what you got, and let me repeat this, because it's not talked about enough. Yeah. Do we have a democracy? Yes, you can go out and vote. That's great. And please, everybody go out and vote. But what most of you cannot do is put hundreds of millions of dollars into a super PAC to elect candidates you want or defeat candidates you don't like. So there's a super PAC out there. They went after Jamal in an unprecedented way, defeated him, went After Cory defeated her. And that is the power of money in politics. And that is why it is absolutely imperative that we get rid of this disastrous Supreme Court decision on Citizens United and move to public funding of elections. Right? This is just money. Look, it is not complicated. If you are this gentleman over here. Probably not. You're a billionaire, and you didn't like Bernie Sanders, or you don't like Cori Bush, you don't like Jamal Bowman. You can start a super pac. You know, Friends of America, call it whatever you want. You could take out a check, put $500 million into that check, get a few of your friends to contribute, and you go after them. Put ads on tv. That's legal. That's what Citizens United allows us to do. Nothing conspiratorial about it. That is the reality of American politics. That's going on in both political parties. Check out the amount of money that billionaires are now contributing, both to the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. And that will answer your question, I think, not only about the war in Gaza, it's why we don't have health care as a human right, why we have massive income and wealth inequality, why we have a corrupt tax system, why we are not able to send our kids to college and make it affordable, et cetera, et cetera. It's money. Money talks.
- [14:27]
A
I want to talk about your career in politics. You have been propping open the Overton window for the past 40 years. And eight years ago, a bunch of my friends were just hunched over a laptop on Reddit, vaping on their phones, just going, you know what? This guy makes a lot of sense. Does it ever get exhausting seeing how slow it takes for the electorate to eventually catch up to ideas that feel so basic?
- [14:55]
B
They feel basic. But there is an idea that I think people don't comprehend, is that the people on top have enormous power. Just think, I'm a little bit older than you. So when I was a kid, people of your color. I couldn't drink at a water fountain in Mississippi, Okay? Go to segregated schools, et cetera. It took God knows how long for people to stand up and fight against segregation and racism. It took a very long time. People died in the struggle, okay? And sheriffs gone out there, and they shot people and they lynched people. You know, there's a movie on Emmett Till and so forth. Yeah.
- [15:38]
A
And there's photos of you marching in the civil rights movement.
- [15:41]
B
My point is. I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but in the real world, when you take on people with Power, they don't fold up and they don't say, you know, Hassam, you made a good point. Hey, we're going to provide health care to all people. Jeez, why did I think of that? What a smart guy? Doesn't work like that. These people have power and they have money and they're extremely greedy.
- [16:04]
A
You're telling me a witty top pinned comment can't take down the billionaire class?
- [16:09]
B
Well, it takes. Yeah, but it takes. You have to think that one through. Taking down the billionaire class ain't easy. They own the media, all right? You know, they own, have enormous power in both political parties. They are very, very powerful people. So that you don't win and change the world overnight. Well, I'm sorry, that's the bad news. It doesn't happen. It didn't happen in the civil rights war. You know, women, I mean, I can remember wasn't so many years ago. This is true. I mean, this is how quickly your generation may not notice. But not so many. A few decades ago, in the United States Senate, 100 people, there were two women, 98 men, two women. The idea of somebody like Kamala Harris running for president, a woman, a black woman, people literally would have said to you, you are absolutely crazy. That ain't never going to happen in 100 years. All right, my point is change happens. We have got to make that change happen faster. But anyone who thinks it happens overnight, it doesn't. You have friends, I suspect, who are gay, right? 30, 40 years ago, people didn't talk about being gay. Now you have a secretary of transportation who is gay. You got governors who are gay.
- [17:22]
A
Right?
- [17:23]
B
All right, that didn't happen by accident. People fought and struggled.
- [17:26]
A
Senator Sanders, unfortunately, that this position has been framed. I believe at times you've been framed in the media as this kind of radical person.
- [17:35]
B
Good point.
- [17:36]
A
But I wanna talk about your Guardian article because what you did is you conducted your own research and you showed that these progressive policies are actually super popular. 10 toes on the ground. This is not a Twitter position. This is not an Instagram stories position. Real irl Americans care about these issues. How much of a gap do you think is there between your platform and 2020? These issues that we talk about, that we feel are common sense in the Harris Waltz platform of 2024?
- [18:07]
B
Well, they don't have a platform yet. They're working on it. You know, in fairness. And it's an important point to make. She has been a candidate now for all of a month, Right. Can you imagine what fell on her shoulders? I Mean, having to organize the campaign. She got a lot of folks from Biden's campaign, but, you know, to organize that, to plan out the rallies that you have to do, to plan out the convention that it's now taken by to select a vice presidential candidate to work on policy stuff, I mean, that is a lot to do in a month. And I think she's been doing a very good job. What I will say, I want to pick up on the point you made.
- [18:38]
A
And amplify it about the Guardian article.
- [18:40]
B
Yeah.
- [18:40]
A
Yes.
- [18:40]
B
All right. What we did, Please do.
- [18:42]
A
Because I ran out of free articles, so I didn't get to read all of it.
- [18:44]
B
Stopped halfway through. What we did is we said, look, I'm called a far left guy, right? Trump has decided that Kamala Harris is a communist. I mean, totally insane. So we asked the American people a lot of simple questions about some of the major issues facing this country. Republicans, Democrats, independents. So we said, do you think that the wealthy and large corporations should pay more in taxes? Shock of all shocks. Over 70% of the American people said yes, including a majority of Republicans. Should we be surprised? No. No. All right.
- [19:23]
A
Yeah, of course.
- [19:24]
B
Question. Should we raise Social Security benefits by lifting the cap on taxable income and extend life by 75 years, in other words, asking the wealthy to contribute more into Social Security? Over 70% of the people said yes. Should we raise the minimum wage to a living wage? American people overwhelmingly said yes. Should we expand Medicare? Right now, Medicare is a good program. It doesn't cover dental, hearing and vision. Should we expand it over 70% in all these instances, a majority of Republicans. So your question, I think, is, if the American people feel that way, why a haven't we done it? Why aren't people. Yeah.
- [20:10]
A
Why haven't they been implemented? And the answer, and I know the.
- [20:12]
B
Answer gets back to what I said a moment ago. It's money. The insurance companies don't like the idea. The rich don't like the idea of paying more in taxes. The insurance companies don't like the idea of expanding Medicare.
- [20:24]
A
Is there a realistic path for my generation to remove money from politics? Is this.
- [20:28]
B
God damn right there is.
- [20:29]
A
You think so?
- [20:29]
B
Yeah. Yeah, I'm thinking what you gotta do.
- [20:32]
A
Hopefully I have a long way to go.
- [20:33]
B
All right. The answer is, of course there is. This money has always played a role in politics, but it was greatly accentuated by this disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision. So we need legislation to get rid of Citizens United and to move to public funding of elections. If you do that, there will no more be super PACs. Billionaires will not be able to play the role they're playing right now. And again, not a radical idea. This exists in many other countries around the world.
- [21:06]
A
I hope we do change it and I hope we do remove money from politics, because we still don't have Medicare for All. Minimum wage is still at 715, which is crazy. When I worked at Safeway in 2003 in Davis, California, I think I was 725. And we are still paying other countries to bomb civilians. I want to ask you about your legacy and what you represent in American politics. Do you ever feel like you failed because these things haven't happened? Or do you feel like a success because these things are now part of the regular conversation?
- [21:37]
B
Well, you know, I'm sure you're familiar with people like Pramila Jayapal and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and Maxwell Frost and many others. Look, what is again, an untold story in the Congress right now, and I just saw Pramil this morning actually, is There are almost 100 members of the Progressive Caucus, and a significant number of them are, are young, often women, people of color. That's a revolution. Never, ever, ever have you had more progressives who are fighting to transform this country in profound ways. Never before have there been that many in the House of Representatives. That isn't true in the Senate. We don't have that in the Senate. But in the House that exists. And I'm proud that my two campaigns have gotten a lot of people to say, you know what? I think I can run. What Bernie is saying makes sense to me. That's an agenda. I think I'm gonna run for office, not only for Congress.
- [22:29]
A
How powerful is that?
- [22:31]
B
Oh, my goodness.
- [22:31]
A
How much can they. Can Congress change the fate of the country? And the way money is moved through.
- [22:37]
B
The country, they can pass legislation which gets money out of politics. That's what I'm saying. You can pass legislation. Super PACs are not biblical, you know, they're not inherent. You can get rid of them tomorrow if you had the legislation to do it. And that's what we've gotta do.
- [22:52]
A
I have so many friends that were burning your bust. And when you didn't win in 2016 or 2020, they bust, they checked out of politics. And then they hard pivoted into bitcoins.
- [23:02]
B
Wow, really?
- [23:02]
A
Then they pivoted into ketamine and Zyn. Let's see where that goes. But they are despondent. Jokes aside, they're despondent. Senator Sanders, where does that Leave your supporters that saw so much hope in the values you were exposing. And what do you say to my friends who now feel like you may be falling in line a little bit too much with the corporate democratic establishment?
- [23:23]
B
Well, look at this particular moment in history, and perhaps at any moment in history, despair is not an option to say, well, I supported Bernie. He didn't win. I'm going into Bitcoin. Sorry, not good enough.
- [23:39]
A
All right, that's going to be your most controversial statement of this whole interview.
- [23:41]
B
All right? There is a reality out there, and the reality is that Donald Trump is not only an authoritarian person, he is a xenophobe. He tries to divide us up by the color of our skin or where we were born. You're familiar with the Muslim ban, to say the least, and so forth and so on. So I think. Not to mention a dozen other issues. So I think if you are a human being who wants to live in a sane and decent society, who is concerned about your kids, you know what? Sorry, you don't have a right to check out. That's a privilege you don't have. You're gonna have to do what people historically have done. You know, I just came from a meeting an hour ago with the trade unionists. There was a time in this city where union people, I'm talking 100 years ago, were beaten up because they wanted to join a union. They were denied food. They were thrown out when they went out on strike, and they stood up and they fought so that people can earn a decent standard of living. You know, women didn't have the right to vote. They didn't have property rights. They stood up and they fought back. So then, now we have today a woman who rests on the shoulders of those women who struggled for 100 years. You have a civil rights movement. Dr. Martin Luther King was here in the city, you know, fighting for justice, got shot trying to organize, work with workers. So people say, oh, my goodness, my candidate didn't win. I'm dropping out. Even the candidate was win. Sorry, I lost. I was there. I'm not dropping out. You got to look at the world as it is and do the best you can. And people can disagree. Hasan, what is the best? How do we go forward? But dropping out is certainly not one of the options.
- [25:16]
A
So I'm 38. A lot of our viewers are around my age. You're 83. We have a long way to go to become your age and to have your. How should we apply the next decades of all things? We're first generation, a Lot of us are first generation kids.
- [25:28]
B
Well, I'm first generation, not a kid. Also first generation older.
- [25:33]
A
I'm a man.
- [25:34]
B
My father came from Poland. I think immediately we got to elect Kamala Harris. But second of all, we have got to keep our eyes on an agenda that speaks to the needs of working people. And by the way, not only is it not a radical agenda, we just discussed how American people support this exists all over the world, right? I live 50 miles away from Canada. You go in a hospital in Canada for three weeks, you know what the bill is when you come out? Do you know? Zero. It's zero. It's publicly funded. It's a human right. And by the way, they spend 50% of what we spend per capita on healthcare. All right? You go to Finland and countries, you know what childcare cost or college education virtually free because they understand. They want a well educated country. They want the kids to do well. These are not radical ideas. They really are common sense ideas supported by the majority of the American people. So what I'm asking your viewers and your listeners to do is to stay focused on the issue. Don't let politicians get off the hook saying, oh, well, yeah, I want to improve health care. Well, what do you mean? Can I go to any doctor that I want without taking out my wallet? Well, I'm not talking about that. What do you mean by that? Should we pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs or should we pay what other countries are paying? So be thinking about what you want as the future of this country demand the politicians deliver it.
- [27:03]
A
Senator Bernie Sanders, thank you so much.
- [27:06]
B
Thank you very much.
- [27:06]
A
This was really great.
- [27:09]
B
Hurry right away no delay stopped make.
- [27:13]
A
Your daddy glad you have had your.
- [27:15]
B
Land Be proud our boys in line.