CNN’s Tapper to Bernie Sanders: ‘Have You Seen Any Evidence of Biden Doing Anything About the Oligarchy During His Four Years of Presidency?’

TAPPER: “So, President Biden in his farewell address last night warned against oligarchs and extreme wealth. I’m just wondering, do you have — have you seen any evidence of Biden doing anything about the oligarchy during his four years of presidency that he warns about?”

Sanders: “Well, in fairness, he has been on domestic issues the most progressive president since FDR. And we’ve created millions of jobs rebuilding our infrastructure. He was the first president to take on the pharmaceutical industry and lower the cost of prescription drugs. No small things. I know that he wanted to raise the minimum wage in terms of the American Relief Act that we passed during Covid. We cut childhood poverty by 40 percent, extended unemployment. We have put more money into sustainable energy and energy efficiency, combating climate change than any president in history. So he has a strong record. But if your question is, do I think — and by the way, it is no small thing that the president of the United States said what is absolutely true. And, Jake, we don’t talk about this enough. And that is when you got three people on top who own more wealth than the bottom half of American society, 170 million people. You know what? That’s oligarchy. When you have massive concentration of ownership in our economy, fewer and fewer corporations owning and controlling the economy. That’s oligarchy. When you have more and more billionaires, whether it’s Musk owning Twitter or Rudolph — Murdoch owning a Fox or other billionaires owning newspapers, that’s oligarchy. And lastly and most importantly, and I think, you know, Biden made this point, is we have just come through an election where you get one vote, I get one vote. But billionaires were able to spend many hundreds of millions of dollars to elect or defeat the candidates that they wanted. You add all of that up, massive concentration of ownership, massive income and wealth inequality, massive amounts of political power, you know what? You just can’t go around saying, well, Russia and Putin, they’re an oligarchy, but we’re not. You know what? We are. And —“

TAPPER: “So, beyond —“

Sanders: “I’m sorry.”

TAPPER: “Well, just beyond, let’s say, a much more aggressive, progressive taxation, that I’m sure you would support, what else could be done theoretically within the bounds of the U.S. Constitution to prevent this?”

Sanders: “Well, the most important thing is to deal with the corrupt and broken campaign finance system. Does anybody in America, whether you’re a conservative, Republican, or a progressive, think that it’s OK for somebody like Musk to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to elect a candidate that he wants and now is going to be working for? And by the way, it’s not just Republicans, it’s Democratic billionaires as well. Election should not be contest between billionaires. It should be one person, one vote. Real debates on the issue. So, overturning the Citizens United Supreme Court decision, in my view, moving to public funding of elections is integral — integral — if we are serious about having a government and a democracy that works for all of us and not just the people who have the money, that’s the most important thing. But what else you could do to deal with oligarchy is start having a government that provides benefits to working people that they desperately need. We are the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people. We have a minimum wage, as we’ve just discussed, $7.25. Why isn’t it 17 bucks an hour? We have a Social Security system which is not adequate for the needs of millions of seniors who are trying to get by on $15,000, $14,000 a year. So yes, there is a lot that we can do politically, economically, to end the oligarchic form of society that we have.”