Sen. Bernard Sanders, the godfather of the modern-day progressive movement, is seeking another term representing Vermont.
Mr. Sanders, 82, said he has the chance to harness the power he has established as a member of the Democratic leadership team and on key committees to address challenges facing his constituents.
“In recent years, working together we have made important progress addressing some very serious challenges. But much, much more needs to be done if we are to become a state and a nation our people deserve,” Mr. Sanders said in a nearly nine-minute video posted Monday on X.
Mr. Sanders is a self-described democratic socialist who caucuses with Senate Democrats. He has served in the Senate since 2007.
There were doubts about whether Mr. Sanders, a two-time presidential candidate, would run for another six-year term in the Senate, considering his age.
In the video, he vowed to keep fighting for universal health care, lowering prescription drug costs, combating climate change, divesting from fossil fuels, taking care of veterans, securing women’s rights, canceling student debt and creating free tuition colleges, breaking the dependence on regressive property tax and creating affordable housing.
He also spoke out against Israel’s response to the attack by the terrorist group Hamas. He said the U.S. tax dollars should not be going to “the extremist Netanyahu government to continue its devastating war against the Palestinian people.”
Mr. Sanders’ influence over the Democratic Party stretches far and wide, pushing the party further to the left with his calls for tax hikes on the wealthy and corporations to help fund government programs such as Medicare for All for the working class and poor communities.
He has inspired a new generation of liberal leaders, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rep. Ro Khanna of California.
His 2016 presidential bid highlighted the growing schism between the party’s mainstream and liberal activist wing, which rallied around his far-left agenda and his targeting of the “billionaire class,” Wall Street, and the pharmaceutical industry.
Looking to smooth things out after the election, Democrats appointed him to the Senate Democratic leadership team.
He now serves as chairman of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and on the Senate Budget and Veterans Affairs Committees.
From those perches, Mr. Sanders has warned the middle class is disappearing and working-class wages have remained too stagnant while the rich get richer, and policy-makers look the other way.
Mr. Sanders stuck to a similar script in his announcement.
“In my view, the United States should join every other major country on earth to guarantee health care to all of our people as a human right, not a privilege,” Mr. Sanders said. “That is a fight we must continue to win.”