Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday blasted the Democratic Party for not paying attention to working class people during a contentious election season.
“There needs to be a profound change in the way the Democratic Party does business. It is not good enough to have a liberal elite,” Sanders told “CBS This Morning.“ He added, ”I come from the white working class and I am deeply humiliated that the Democratic Party can’t talk to the people where I came from.”
Sanders, who campaigned in 2016 as a Democrat but is again an independent, added that the Democrats are cut off from working class voters—and need to be a voice against Wall Street and drug corporations.
Trump, meanwhile, was able to tap into voters’ frustrations. “We’re going to hold Mr. Trump accountable,” Sanders stipulated on the morning show.
In a New York Times opinion piece on Friday, Sanders cautioned Trump on his perceived inflammatory rhetoric.
“There is no compromise on racism, bigotry, xenophobia, and sexism,” Sanders wrote. “We will fight it in all its forms, whenever and wherever it re-emerges.”
Sanders also responded to questions on whether he could have taken on Trump, a Republican, instead of Hillary Clinton. Some have speculated that Sanders could have beaten Trump.
“Hindsight is great, Charlie. I don’t know the answer to that. Maybe, maybe not,” Sanders noted. “She should have won this election by 10 percentage points. The question is why is it that millions of white working class people who voted for Obama turned their backs on the Democratic Party,” he said.
Sanders said he now supports Rep. Keith Ellison, a Democrat from Minnesota, to be the chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
DNC emails leaked by WikiLeaks in July show that Democratic Party officials heavily favored Clinton over him. Sanders, however, lent his support to Clinton and campaigned for her.
