Bernie Sanders Talks About Main Differences Between Himself And Elizabeth Warren
In an interview with ABC News to be broadcast on Sunday, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders distinguished himself from fellow White House hopeful Elizabeth Warren.
Both Sanders and Warren are thought to represent the more progressive wing of the Democratic Party, but there are significant differences between the two.
According to Sanders, their main divergence concerns their views on economic policy.
“I am a capitalist to my bones,” Warren said in 2018, during an event hosted by the New England Council.
Sanders, he says, is not.
After pushing back on the idea that he and Warren hold “identical positions,” the Vermont senator revealed how he is different from his Massachusetts peer.
“Elizabeth considers herself — if I got the quote correctly — to be a capitalist to her bones. I don’t.”
Explaining why he is a unique candidate, Sanders said that he is the only person in the crowded 2020 Democratic presidential primary field willing to challenge the ruling class.
“I am, I believe, the only candidate who’s going to say to the ruling class of this country, the corporate elite: Enough. Enough with your greed and with your corruption,” the senator said. “We need real change in this country,” he added.
Sanders also noted that he has been friends with Warren “for some 25 years,” and that he considers her to be a “very, very good senator.”
As ABC News notes, Warren has recently eclipsed Sanders in most national and early primary state polls. Coupled with the fact that the Vermont senator recently had a health scare, his performance in the polls has prompted some to cast doubt on the success of his presidential bid.
In 2016, Sanders ran against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a right-leaning Democrat, and had an easier time positioning himself as the only truly progressive option.
Left-leaning magazine Current Affairs recently highlighted some of the key differences between Sanders and Warren, noting that there are major strategic and ideological differences between the two. Their policy proposals are quite different as well, with Sanders’ being far more aggressive.
At the end of the day, we have one life to live, and you ask yourself, what role do I want to play?
That role must go deeper than defeating Trump.
We must create a country where people are working to take care of each other. pic.twitter.com/g327uGrRow
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) October 10, 2019
But it is not only the candidates themselves that differ, their bases do as well. As Politico put it, “Sanders and Warren voters have astonishingly little in common.” Sanders’ coalition is racially diverse and mostly made up of lower income, working class voters.
Warren’s base, on the other hand, consists largely of voters with postgraduate degrees, older voters, and those who follow politics more closely.
In order to win the nomination, according to Politico, both of them need to expand their voter pool.
Sanders has not received nearly as much positive media attention as Warren and other candidates in the race, according to his supporters, who recently spread via social media a video compilation of cable news talking heads slamming the Vermont senator.
