-Welcome back. We're here with Senator Bernie Sanders.
You were with President Biden at his inauguration,
and you became a meme.
We've talked about you and your mittens.
-Yeah. -I'd heard you lost the mittens,
but then I realized -- not true. -Not true. Fake news.
-Fake news. But there's a reason we don't see the mittens.
-My wife is hiding them away someplace.
-Yeah.
She worried you're getting too involved in social media,
becoming a meme? -[ Laughs ]
-So she's hid the mittens, and that's why we don't see
the mittens. -It's gonna be a legacy
for the grandchildren.
-Right. Those mittens are going to be worth
a lot of scratch when the time comes.
I know you have a lot
of immense personal respect for President Biden.
Obviously, we have an election coming up.
The Democratic voting coalition is very diverse.
A lot of different kinds of people.
Make a case for why
you think people should turn out for President Biden in November.
-Well, for a first step,
it's absolutely imperative that Donald Trump be defeated.
[ Cheers and applause ]
And it's -- let me, you know -- and what this election is about,
it is not just policy.
It's not just differences of views on health care,
education, or tax policy.
You have a president, former president,
who really does not believe in democracy.
He's trying to undermine democracy.
He is a pathological liar.
And he is, in very intense ways,
trying to divide our people up.
Look, this country faces enormous problems today,
and we all know what they are.
We're talking about income and wealth inequality.
We're talking about 60% of workers
living paycheck to paycheck. We're talking about
the existential threat of climate change.
Enormous problems facing this country.
But instead of focusing
and providing solutions to those problems,
what Trump is trying to do is get us to hate each other
based on where we were born,
or the color of our skin or our sexual orientation,
and we just cannot allow that to happen.
And then on top of all that, you got a guy in Trump
who, during his presidency,
gave massive tax breaks to the rich at a time
when we have unprecedented income and wealth inequality.
It's the last thing they need.
This guy wants to throw tens of millions of people
off of the health insurance that they have.
He appointed anti-union members of his administration
to make it harder for workers to form unions.
And I'll tell you, all over this country,
women are fighting for the right to control their own bodies.
He wants to take that away. [ Cheers and applause ]
So that's Trump.
And on the other hand, in Biden --
I'm not going to sit here.
You know, I ran against Biden, so I'm not going to sit here
and tell you that I agree with everything Joe Biden is doing.
I don't, big time. But on the other hand,
this is the first president in the history of the United States
to walk on a picket line with workers.
And that's a pretty impressive thing.
We've made some progress
in lowering the cost of prescription drugs
and taking on the pharmaceutical industry.
The economy, as you've indicated,
is really doing well. Unemployment extremely low.
We're creating a whole lot of jobs,
rebuilding manufacturing in America.
So we're beginning to move forward in the right direction.
In my view, we have a lot, lot more to do.
But the choice in this election is very clear.
If you do not believe in democracy,
if you really want to turn your back on the millions of men
and women who fought to defend democracy,
I guess Trump is your candidate. But if you believe in
what this country is supposed to value,
is that we all come together as one people,
we believe in the rule of law, Biden is your candidate.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-I want to ask,
because I know you've been a voice in the Senate
over the current situation in the Middle East.
We are almost four months after the horrifically
unforgivable acts of October 7th.
You've called Hamas a disgusting terrorist organization.
Many hostages are not back.
And yet we also see an unspeakable loss
of civilian lives in Gaza. Is there --
Do you have any optimism for a peaceful future for Israelis?
-I hope to God it takes place.
And as you've just indicated,
Hamas began this war with their horrific,
brutal terrorist attack against --
killing 1,200 innocent Israelis,
wounding more, taking over 200 people hostage.
But I have to tell you that what Netanyahu
and his right wing government are doing right now
to the people of Palestine is -- of Gaza
is indescribable and unspeakable.
I mean, we're looking at 25--
26,000 people who have been killed already,
two-thirds of whom are women and children,
65,000 people who have been wounded.
We're looking at 70% of the housing units in Gaza
have been damaged or destroyed. Can you believe that?
70%? You're looking at 1.8 million people
pushed out of their homes. God knows where they're going.
And right now, and this is -- I hope everybody hears this.
You're looking at the possibility
of hundreds of thousands of children starving to death.
And we in the United States,
through our financial support of Israel,
are complicit in what's happening.
And I will be damned if I'm going to give another nickel
to the Netanyahu government in order to continue this war
against the Palestinian people.
-Do you see -- I mean, it all seems so, uh --
impossible -- I mean, I certainly don't know
the solution I wouldn't ever claim to,
but do you see any hope for optimism
that there's a future for the Palestinians and the Israelis?
-The history of the region is terrible.
You know, we don't have the time to go into it.
Deals with the Holocaust, 6 million Jews.
It deals with the displacement
of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their home.
But at the end of the day, the people, Palestinian people
are entitled to a homeland of their own.
So we're talking about a two-state solution.
Hamas cannot be, in my view, part of that equation.
They are a terrorist jihadist group.
There are people, Palestinians, who believe in democracy,
Palestinians who do believe
in improving the lives of people there.
We've got to work with those people
and create a long term solution
where Israel has the security that it is entitled to
and the Palestinians have a state of their own
and the freedom that they are entitled to.
-Well, we really appreciate any time
you make time for us. It is such a pleasure.
Thank you so much, Senator Sanders.
-Thank you. -Senator Bernie Sanders,
everybody.
"It's OK to be Angry About Capitalism"
is in paperback February 20th.
-We'll be right back with Zosia Mamet.