Political positions of Bernie Sanders
[17] Andrei Markovits, professor of political science at the University of Michigan, defines democratic socialism as "an attempt to create a property-free, socialist society", and something that does not exist in Denmark or anywhere else in the world, and argues that Sanders' explanation of the term is inaccurate.
In April 2015, Sanders articulated his position in an interview with The Guardian: What we have seen is that while the average person is working longer hours for lower wages, we have seen a huge increase in income and wealth inequality, which is now reaching obscene levels.
[45][46] In February 2014, Sanders was one of fifteen senators to sign a letter to the Treasury Department and IRS urging the Obama administration to implement rules that would "only close a loophole that has until now allowed donors to evade campaign finance law disclosure requirements" and defending the proposed changes as not restricting "anyone’s right to speak, or to spend money to influence elections.
"[47] In 2016, Sanders wrote an op-ed to Philadelphia magazine stating that while he supported city government initiatives to fund universal pre-kindergarten education, he opposed mayor Jim Kenney's soda tax on the grounds that it would disproportionately impact the poor.
"[60] On June 20, 2021, Sanders stated that he would not support paying for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which would spend over $1.2 trillion on roads, bridges, broadband, passenger rail, a new entity called ARPA-I, and the hydrogen economy, among others, via a proposed gas tax or a surcharge on electric vehicles.
Almost one-third of America's major roads are in poor or mediocre condition ..." Sanders has introduced amendments to Senate bills (S.Amendt.323) promoting the creation of millions of middle-class jobs by investing in infrastructure, paid for by closing what he characterizes as loopholes in the corporate and international tax system.
[98][99][100] Nobel Memorial Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman said that "such a bill would essentially empower the cranks — the gold-standard-loving, hyperinflation-is-coming types who dominate the modern G.O.P., and have spent the past five or six years trying to bully monetary policy makers into ceasing and desisting from their efforts to prevent economic disaster.
"[101] In a December 2015 op-ed, Sanders called for creating board positions on the Federal Reserve for "representatives from all walks of life — including labor, consumers, homeowners, urban residents, farmers and small businesses.
[112] In May 2019, Sanders and Representative Barbara Lee introduced the Inclusive Prosperity Act, imposing a "fraction of a percent" tax on stock, bond, and derivatives trading, estimated to generate 2.4 trillion from Wall Street investors over a 10-year period.
[130] In February 2019, in response to reports of the EPA intending to decide against setting drinking water limits for Perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) and Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) as part of an upcoming national strategy to manage the aforementioned class of chemicals, Sanders was one of twenty senators to sign a letter to Acting EPA Administrator Andrew R. Wheeler, calling on the agency "to develop enforceable federal drinking water standards for PFOA and PFOS, as well as institute immediate actions to protect the public from contamination from additional per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS)".
"[150] In January 2016, Sanders was one of twenty-nine senators to sign a letter spearheaded by Ron Wyden and Sheldon Whitehouse to President Obama urging him to issue a final executive order that would require federal contractors to disclose political donations, arguing that form of disclosure was "a modest step that would expose an especially troubling type of secret money: campaign contributions that have the potential to influence government contracting practices.
[189] Following Patrick M. Shanahan announcing 1,000 more US troops being deployed to the Middle East for defensive purposes in June 2019, Sanders was one of six senators to sign a letter spearheaded by Tim Kaine and Mike Lee, expressing concern that "increasingly escalatory actions" by both the US and Iran would "lead to an unnecessary conflict".
"[199] Then, in September 2019, Sanders told the Washington Post, "The world and in particular the Syrian people would be far better off without Bashar al-Assad, who is responsible for the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women and children, the forced migration of millions and the collapse of the nation of Syria.
"[202] The Intercept's Zaid Jilani wrote that Sanders "stood out in contrast to the remarks from the other four major party candidates" in the 2016 presidential election, criticizing Israel's policy of settlement expansion after violent episodes and defended self-determination, civil rights, and economic well-being for Palestinians.
[210] The Anti-Defamation League subsequently called on Sanders to withdraw remarks he made about the casualties, which the ADL said exaggerated the death toll of the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, citing a number far in excess of Palestinian or Israel sources' estimates.
[231] On December 14, 2023, Sanders introduced a privileged resolution invoking Section 502(b) of the Foreign Assistance Act, calling on the State Department to investigate Israeli crimes against humanity in its conduct of the war in Gaza, effectively forcing a Senate vote on withholding military aid to Israel.
In fact, Kissinger's actions in Cambodia, when the United States bombed that country, overthrew Prince Sihanouk, created the instability for Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge to come in who then butchered some 3 million innocent people – one of the worst genocides in the history of the world.
[243] In August 2011, Sanders's official Senate webpage re-printed in full an editorial from the West Lebanon, New Hampshire Valley News stating: "These days, the American dream is more apt to be realized in South America, in places such as Ecuador, Venezuela and Argentina, where incomes are actually more equal today than they are in the land of Horatio Alger.
[187] During December 2018, in response to President Trump's October announcement that he intended to withdraw the United States from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, Sanders was one of seven senators to cosponsor the Prevention of Arms Race Act of 2018, legislation prohibiting funding for a U.S. ground-launched or ballistic missile that had "a range of between 500 and 5,500 kilometers" until the administration provided a report meeting five specific conditions.
[266] In December 2018, after United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the Trump administration was suspending its obligations in the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 60 days in the event that Russia continued to violate the treaty, Sanders was one of twenty-six senators to sign a letter expressing concern over the administration "now abandoning generations of bipartisan U.S. leadership around the paired goals of reducing the global role and number of nuclear weapons and ensuring strategic stability with America's nuclear-armed adversaries" and calling on President Trump to continue arms negotiations.
He implied NATO was acting with "intransigence", said "The fact is that the US and Ukraine entering into a deeper security relationship is likely to have some very serious costs – for both countries," and argued it is "hypocritical" for the United States to consider the foreign policy interests of its neighbors (per the Monroe Doctrine) but not view Russia as justified in doing so.
"[275] He announced his support for targeted sanctions against "Putin and his oligarchs" and emphasized the need for the United States to help "Ukraine's neighbors care for refugees fleeing this conflict" and the rest of the world to pursue a fossil fuel phase-out to "deny authoritarian petrostates the revenues they require to survive" .
"[277] In October 2017, Sanders and six Democrats were led by Chris Murphy in introducing legislation prohibiting "funds from being used for kinetic military operations without congressional approval unless the United States faces an imminent threat or such action is necessary to defend citizens or our allies" in light of rhetorical escalation between the US and North Korea as well as "contradictory behavior from Trump and officials in his administration".
[291] In a column for The New York Times, Sanders called on the United States to end its backing of the Saudi intervention in Yemen against the Houthis, saying that US support for this war makes it complicit in crimes against humanity and that its participation is unconstitutional because it had not been authorized by Congress.
Sanders believes closing corporate tax loopholes is the solution, and has developed both a proposal to improve debtors' ability to refinance student loans at lower interest rates,[319][320] and a plan bringing matching grants from the federal and state governments to cut tuition at public universities by more than half.
[337] In a February 2019 letter to Catalyst Pharmaceuticals, Sanders criticized the company's decision to set the annual list price of Firdapse at $375,000, which was previously free, as "a blatant fleecing of American taxpayers", and "also an immoral exploitation of patients who need this medication".
Sanders also pledged to reverse the Trump administration's elimination of an Obama-era rule allowing small farmers to pursue legal action when abused by large corporation middlemen, and restore an agency inside the United States Department of Agriculture tasked with enforcing anti-trust laws within the meatpacking industry.
"[389] In September 2014, Sanders was one of 69 members of the US House and Senate to sign a letter to then-FDA commissioner Sylvia Burwell requesting that the FDA revise its policy banning donation of corneas and other tissues by men who have had sex with another man in the preceding 5 years.
[415] In April 2019, Sanders was one of nineteen senators to sign a letter to top members on the Appropriations Committee Richard Shelby and Patrick Leahy, and top members of its Homeland Security subcommittee Shelley Moore Capito and Jon Tester, indicating that they could not "support the appropriation of funds that would expand this administration's unnecessarily cruel immigration enforcement policies, its inhumane immigrant detention systems, or its efforts to build the president's vanity projects", and urging Congress to "resist efforts to raid critical and effective public safety programs in order to pay for political theatrics", as President Trump's "manufactured emergency" was not justification for "spending taxpayer dollars on an ineffective wall".
"[442] In June 2019, Sanders was one of fifteen senators to introduce the Affordable Medications Act, legislation intended to promote transparency through mandating pharmaceutical companies disclose the amount of money going toward research and development in addition to both marketing and executives' salaries.
