Senator Bernie Sanders did not mince words after the election. He walked into a news conference led by Senator Chuck Schumer and said party leaders failed to back Zohran Mamdani in New York and Graham Platner in Maine. \u201cThe party leadership did not support Mamdani in New York,\u201d Sanders said from the Senate podium. He argued that top Democrats were \u201cdefending the status quo and the inequalities that exist in America,\u201d and insisted that \u201cthere is a growing understanding that leadership\u2026 is not where the American people are.\u201d Mamdani, a democratic socialist, went on to win the New York City mayor\u2019s race, a result that Sanders said should send a message well beyond the five boroughs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sanders\u2019 expectation was basic. He wanted the party to honor the primary\u2019s outcome and rally behind its nominee. At a CNN town hall with Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, he praised Mamdani\u2019s organizing muscle and asked why party leaders would hesitate. \u201cThe guy is running an extraordinary campaign,\u201d he said. \u201cHe has something like 80,000 volunteers knocking on doors. He is bringing people out who never voted.\u201d Ocasio-Cortez added a standard she believes should apply everywhere. \u201cDemocrats have primaries for a reason,\u201d she said. \u201cI believe in endorsing the nominee of the party after a primary has resolved itself.\u201d When asked if he was speaking directly to Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, Sanders replied, \u201cSure, I am. Hakeem, you watching this?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For Sanders, the issue is not only one race. He says national leaders have drifted from the party\u2019s working-class roots and allow big donors and consultants to set priorities. In his words, \u201cThere is little doubt in my mind that the Democratic leadership is way out of touch with where the American people are at.\u201d He criticized top Democrats who \u201crefused to endorse Mamdani after the primary, or provided half-hearted support at best,\u201d and argued, \u201cTheir allegiance primarily is to the money interest, to the consultant class, and not to working families.\u201d He believes this disconnect leaves voters who want change feeling ignored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sanders treats Mamdani\u2019s victory as proof that a grassroots strategy can beat concentrated money. \u201cPeople want real change,\u201d he told The Nation, and a \u201cstrong victory on the part of Mamdani\u2026 will inspire people all across our country to fight for that change.\u201d He highlighted the campaign\u2019s scale and focus on affordability. \u201cWhat I love about the Mamdani campaign\u2026 is that he has some 80,000 volunteers knocking on doors and doing everything that has to be done to win,\u201d Sanders said. If Mamdani governs well, he added, \u201cthe understanding will spread all over the country that working people can have representatives and mayors who stand for them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sanders has spent the year on a \u201cFighting Oligarchy\u201d tour and has pressed the same theme in interviews and opinion pieces. He argues the United States is sliding into a system run by billionaires. \u201cWe are moving rapidly into an oligarchic form of society,\u201d he said. \u201cNever before in American history have so few billionaires\u2026 had so much wealth and so much power.\u201d He ties this to campaign finance, media influence, and policymaking that he says favors the wealthy. He warns that a small number of donors can pour money into elections to buy outcomes, noting that \u201cin 2024, just 150 billionaire families spent nearly $2 billion to purchase candidates.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When Sanders talks about oligarchs, he means billionaires and aligned interests in finance, tech, and real estate who use their wealth to shape politics and markets. He described New York donors opposed to Mamdani as unusually blunt. \u201cThese billionaires are saying: \u2018we\u2019ve got to do everything we can to stop him,\u2019\u201d he said. He claimed they were \u201con the front page\u201d declaring, \u201cWe can\u2019t have a democratic socialist as mayor.\u201d To Sanders, that is oligarchs \u201csaying, \u2018To hell with what the people want.\u2019\u201d He also points to national figures with outsized sway. \u201cYou got Mr. Musk able to contribute 270 million to elect Donald Trump,\u201d he said, and he argues that \u201cDemocratic billionaires\u201d also play a powerful role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sanders\u2019 critique is specific and wide ranging. He says oligarchs fund campaigns to win tax breaks, to weaken unions, and to block regulation in areas such as artificial intelligence. He connects this to daily hardship for families. \u201cThere is growing disgust at income and wealth disparity,\u201d he said, along with \u201ca healthcare system which is virtually collapsing\u201d and \u201ckids in the wealthiest nation on earth\u201d who may \u201chave a standard of living that is lower than their parents\u2019.\u201d He argues that concentrated wealth \u201clikes authoritarianism,\u201d because leaders who centralize power make it easier to strip away checks that protect workers and consumers. In that climate, he says, \u201cour job is to create an economy and a political system that works for working people, not just billionaires.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Schumer used the same news conference to deliver a different message aimed at Republicans during the shutdown. \u201cLast night, Republicans felt the political repercussions,\u201d he said. \u201cIt should serve as nothing short of a five-alarm fire.\u201d He argued it had been \u201ca really good night for Democrats and our fight to lower costs, improve health care and reach a better future,\u201d and urged President Trump to \u201csit down with [Democrats] to discuss healthcare issues.\u201d Sanders did not dispute the shutdown focus, but he used the moment to press party leaders on their own house, saying leaders should back nominees like Mamdani and stop treating grassroots campaigns as liabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sanders says the next test is governing. He believes that if Mamdani \u201cshows that a mayor that stands with the working class\u2026 can in fact successfully govern and improve life for working-class people,\u201d it will strengthen a national movement that focuses on affordability and democratic accountability. He links that outcome to a larger mission. \u201cPeople are tired of the greed of the oligarchs,\u201d he said. \u201cEnough is enough. Let\u2019s elect somebody who\u2019s going to represent us and not just the 1 percent.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
NP Editor:<\/strong> Bernie desperately wanted to lead the socialist revolution in the U.S. He failed. Now he sees Mamdani and AOC and is trying to make himself relevant again. I honestly think he is energized by this. But it remains to be seen whether the new socialists will a) grow in power, and b) include Bernie before he has to retire.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Senator Bernie Sanders did not mince words after the election. He walked into a news conference led by Senator Chuck Schumer and said party leaders failed to back Zohran Mamdani in New York and Graham Platner in Maine. \u201cThe party leadership did not support Mamdani in New York,\u201d Sanders said from the Senate podium. He argued that top Democrats were \u201cdefending the status quo and the inequalities that exist in America,\u201d and insisted that \u201cthere is a growing understanding that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8,18,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-democrats","category-elections","category-politics","category-woke-agenda"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/berniemamdani.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6684"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6686,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6684\/revisions\/6686"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}