Kamala Harris lost the 2024 election due to the influence of “very wealthy people,” Bernie Sanders told CNN’s Dana Bash this weekend. “All right, let’s be clear in my view,” Sanders added, “The current political system in the United States of America is broken and corrupt.”
Sanders clarified at the beginning of the segment that Harris is a “friend of mine” but immediately added, “she was … heavily influenced by very wealthy people” during her brief 2024 run. Harris was named the Democratic candidate for president only a handful of months before the election.
“How do you run for president and not develop a strong agenda, which speaks to the economic crises facing working families?” Sanders asked. “You have more income and wealth inequality today than we’ve ever had. You have 60% of our people living paycheck-to-paycheck. You got a healthcare system which is broken and dysfunctional. And despite spending so much, we’re the only major country not to guarantee healthcare all people.”
After Bash interjected that Harris spoke “about affordability,” Sanders demurred and said he didn’t “want to rehash that campaign” but does see it as a useful guide for Democrats in the future.
“But I think the clue to Democratic victories is to understand that you got to stand unequivocally with the working class of this country,” he said. “You need an agenda that speaks to the needs of working people. Is it a radical idea that we join every other major country and guarantee healthcare 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’ve got to raise the minimum wage to $17 an hour?”
Harris’ campaign was dissected in the days and weeks that followed Trump’s Election Night victory.
“I think if this campaign is reducible to one moment, we are in a 65% wrong-track country,” James Carville said on November 10. “The country wants something different. And she’s asked, as is so often the case, in a friendly audience, on ‘The View,’ ‘How would you be different than Biden?’ That’s the one question that you exist to answer, alright? That is it. That’s the money question. That’s the one you want. That’s the one that everybody wants to know the answer to. And you freeze! You literally freeze and say, ‘Well, I can’t think of anything,’” he explained while speaking to Tim Miller on the Bulwark podcast.
