In a speech at George Washington University on Wednesday, Sen. Bernie Sanders laid out his vision of a democratic socialist society and made the case for why an ambitious agenda centered on economic rights for all is the only way to confront America’s deep inequities and defeat far-right authoritarianism.
“We must recognize that in the 21st century, in the wealthiest country in the history of the world, economic rights are human rights,” said Sanders, a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate. “And that is what I mean by democratic socialism.”
Decrying an economic system that has left millions of families one accident or sickness away from complete “devastation” while billionaires thrive, Sanders said the Democratic Party must “take up the unfinished business of the New Deal and carry it to completion” by guaranteeing healthcare, education, housing, and a clean environment to all as a right.
Sanders acknowledged that he and other progressives fighting for a bold transformation of American society will face relentless attacks from the oligarchs and corporate forces invested in upholding the status quo, from Wall Street to the military-industrial complex to the pharmaceutical industry.
On this point, Sanders quoted a famous line from Franklin Delano Roosevelt: “Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me. And I welcome their hatred.”
“I must say,” the Vermont senator added, “it does sound a little contemporary, doesn’t it?”
Sanders argued that the corporate forces standing in the way of necessary economic, political, and environmental change can only be overcome by a grassroots progressive movement committed to creating a just society.
The United States, Sanders said, must reject the “corporatist economics” and xenophobia of President Donald Trump and other far-right leaders and instead choose a “path of compassion, justice, and love.”
Watch Sanders’s speech, entitled “How Democratic Socialism Is the Only Way to Defeat Oligarchy and Authoritarianism”:
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