Watch Out Hillary: Vermont’s Socialist Senator Is Mulling His Own Presidential Run
“I am thinking about running for president,’’ said a left-leaning politician who appeared in Iowa this weekend. We’re not talking about Hillary Clinton, though. That quote comes from Vermont US Senator Bernie Sanders.
Sanders, an Independent who calls himself a Socialist and caucuses with Senate Democrats, took aim at “big money interests’’ in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.’’
“I think anybody who speaks to the needs of the working class and the middle class of this country and shows the courage to take on the billionaire class, I think that candidate will do pretty well,’’ he said.
On Sunday, Sanders was in Des Moines before 300-400 raucous fans, who urged him to run for the White House in 2016.
“There are a lot of great Democrats, I work with them,’’ Sanders said at the event, according to MSNBC. “But I think it’s fair to say that average people do not perceive that the Democratic Party standing up for the working people of this country.’’
His event was far smaller than Hillary Clinton’s10,000-strong pseudo-campaign rally at Sen. Tom Harkins Democratic Steak Fry. Though neither officially declared a presidential run, each strongly suggested consideration of the idea.
Sanders would be considered a long shot, but his candidacy could affect Clinton’s calculations. If Sanders were to run for president as an Independent, he could siphon off some votes from the progressive left that would otherwise go to Clinton. And if he were to switch parties and run in the Democratic primary, his socialist views could push Clinton to move more to the left, The Hill notes.
In his “Meet the Press’’ interview, Sanders insisted he had a “lot of respect’’ for Clinton, but “the issue is not Hillary.’’ The issue of Sanders, though, does affect Clinton’s potential campaign.
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