Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders eviscerated former Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign over the weekend, saying her advisers were overly cozy with the rich and failed to champion a strong, specific working-class agenda.
During an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” host Dana Bash played a clip of Sanders telling an audience in West Virginia: “One of the reasons, in my view, that Kamala Harris lost the election is, she had too many billionaires telling her not to speak up for the working class of this country.”
“I like Kamala. She’s a friend of mine,” the 83-year-old told co-host Dana Bash, “but her core consultants were heavily influenced by very wealthy people.
“How do you run for president and not develop a strong agenda which speaks to the economic crises facing working families?” Sanders went on.
“You have more income and wealth inequality today than we have ever had. You have 60% of our people living paycheck to paycheck. You have got a health care system which is broken and dysfunctional. And despite spending so much, we’re the only major country not to guarantee health care to all people. How do you not talk about those issues?”
When Bash suggested that Harris had “talked about affordability” on the campaign trail, Sanders began to respond that she had done so “in a vague” way before cutting himself off and saying: “I don’t want to rehash that campaign.”
“The clue to Democratic victories is to understand that you have got to stand unequivocally with the working class of this country. You need an agenda that speaks to the needs of working people,” the senator pivoted.
“Is it a radical idea that we join every other major country on Earth and guarantee health care to all people? Is that a radical idea? You tell me how many people are talking about that. Is it a radical idea to say that we have got to raise the minimum wage to $17 an hour?”
The 2016 and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate also shrugged off the suggestion that his far-left agenda is off-putting to too many Americans, insisting that critics were simply disillusioned that the “government is too bureaucratic and not responsive.”
“Do you think that, in America, with all of our genius, all of our capabilities, we, spending so much money, cannot provide a high- quality system that guarantees health care to all people?” he asked. “And do you think people here don’t know that? They know. They know we can do it.”
On July 30, Harris announced she would not run for governor of her home state of California next year, opening the door to a possible 2028 White House run.
The following day, the ex-VP revealed plans to release a book, “107 Days,” about her unsuccessful bid to succeed former President Joe Biden.