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Sen. Bernie Sanders has faith that the American people understand what “oligarchy” means, defending his use of the term from fellow Democrats Sen. Elise Slotkin and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who have argued that it doesn’t resonate with voters.
“I think the American people are not quite as dumb as Ms. Slotkin thinks they are,” Sanders said on NBC’s Meet the Press. “I think they understand very well, when the top one percent owns more wealth than the bottom 90 percent, when big money interests are able to control both political parties, they are living in an oligarchy. And these are precisely the issues that have got to be talked about.”
Slotkin said in a Politico interview that she wants Democrats to stop using the word “oligarchy” because it doesn’t resonate with voters outside coastal institutions. Instead, she said the party should say it doesn’t support “kings.” She also said that Democrats need to change their public perception that they are the “weak and woke” party.
Walz, who ran as Kamala Harris’ vice presidential candidate, said that Democrats should stop using words like “oligarch” and “food insecurity” in favor of alternatives, like “greedy billionaires” and “hungry.”
Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a fellow Democrat, are leading a nationwide “Fighting Oligarchy” tour that, according to Sanders’ communications director Anna Bahr, has attracted more than 250,000 total attendees to its rallies. While neither Slotkin nor Walz mentioned Sanders or Ocasio-Cortez, their comments came as their tour attracted tens of thousands of people to each event.
“Plenty of politicians on both sides of the aisle feel threatened by rising class consciousness,” Ocasio-Cortez posted to social media hours after Slotkin’s interview was published.
“The very rich [are] getting richer, working-class people are struggling, 800,000 people sleeping out on the streets,” Sanders said Sunday. “If we don’t address that issue, the American people will continue to turn their backs on democracy because they’re looking around, and they’re saying, ‘Does anybody understand what I am going through?’ And unfortunately, right now, to a large degree, neither party does.”
Sanders denied that he and Ocasio-Cortez are trying to start a third party when host Kristen Welker asked if that was their goal.
“What we’re trying to do is strengthen American democracy, where faith in both the Democratic and Republican parties right now is extremely low,” he said.
“We are living, Kristen, in the richest country in the history of the world,” Sanders added. “And yet you got one person, [Elon] Musk, who owns more wealth than the bottom 53 percent of American households. That is insane. That is oligarchy on steroids.”
