State of the Union: Interview with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)

Interview

"Well, what I mean, by that, Dana, is that the president has a right to be very proud of many of the accomplishments that we have achieved in the last three years, unemployment very, very low.

We have brought inflation down. We're investing in clean energy. We're rebuilding our infrastructure. We have made real progress in a number of areas. But the reality is that, today, 60 percent of our people are living paycheck to paycheck. We have massive levels of income and wealth inequality. Three people have more wealth than the bottom half of America.

Our health care system is a total disaster, 85 million people uninsured, uninsured, underinsured, while the insurance companies make huge profits, the cost of pharmaceutical drugs, prescription drugs sky high.

So, the point is, in my view, the president should tout his very good record. We have got to continue to defend women's right to control their own bodies.

But we have to deal with the reality of life today. That's what Roosevelt did back in 1936. And that is to understand that we have massive levels of corporate greed in every part of society. Very rich are getting richer. Working people are struggling.

We have got to make it clear we're going to stand with those workers. We're going to have a health care system that works for all. Lower the cost of prescription drugs. Raise the minimum wage to a living wage.

[09:25:02]

And so I think that was the message of yesterday.

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Yes.

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Right.

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Well, I...

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Well, that's a great question.

And here's the absurdity. You have a Republican Party that wants to give massive tax breaks to billionaires, a Republican Party that does not want to raise the minimum wage, a Republican Party that opposes legislation that will give workers the right to form unions, a Republican Party which wants to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

And the reason I think they do well among working-class people is, the Democrats have not been strong enough to oppose that agenda and present a strong alternative agenda. In other words, you can't be pro- labor and pro-worker unless you have the guts to take on these large, profitable corporations who are exercising an unprecedented level of corporate greed.

The American people have got to know the reason that inflation was high last year was not because primarily of the war in Ukraine or a breakdown in supply chains. It was because of corporate greed in the fossil fuel industry, in the food industry, in the pharmaceutical industry.

These guys raised prices like crazy, while they made record-breaking profits.

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Well, Dana, one of the, I think very positive things that's happening in America today is that working-class people are standing up and fighting back.

We have just seen the Teamsters take on UPS and win a really strong contract for their workers. We're seeing nurses all over this country stand up and fight back for decent wages and working conditions and for their patients.

Right now, what you have is, the Big Three auto industry, they are making huge profits, while real wages for those workers have not kept up with inflation over the last 10 or 20 years. So I very strongly support the UAW and their new leadership standing up and fighting back. And I certainly hope there is not going to be a strike. No one wants a strike. But the Big Three have got to understand they cannot have it all. They

can't make huge profits, give exorbitant compensation packages to their CEOs and ignore the needs of workers. So I hope they will sit down with the union and negotiate a contract that is fair to the workers in the industry.

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Well, my reaction is, it certainly is not the best economy that we can create. That is was what my speech was about yesterday.

We have got a join the rest of the industrialized world, guarantee health care for all. We got to cut the cost of prescription drugs in half. We got to raise the minimum wage to at least 17 bucks an hour. We got to build the affordable housing we desperately need.

But where I disagree with my good friend Cornel West is, I think, in these really very difficult times, where there is a real question whether democracy is going to remain in the United States of America -- you know, Donald Trump is not somebody who believes in democracy -- whether women are going to be able to continue to control their own bodies, whether we have social justice in America, we end bigotry.

Around that, I think we have got to bring the entire progressive community to defeat Trump or whoever the Republican nominee will be, support Biden, but, at the same time, which is what I did yesterday, is demand that the Democratic Party, not just Biden, have the guts to take on corporate greed and the massive levels of income and wealth inequality that we see today.

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Thank you very much.

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