In an interview with the Guardian from his home base in Burlington, Vermont, Sanders urged the Democratic president to inject more urgency into his bid for re-election. He said that unless the president was more direct in recognising the many crises faced by working-class families his Republican rival would win.

“We’ve got to see the White House move more aggressively on healthcare, on housing, on tax reform, on the high cost of prescription drugs,” Sanders said. “If we can get the president to move in that direction, he will win; if not, he’s going to lose.”

The US senator from Vermont added that he was in contact with the White House pressing that point. “We hope to make clear to the president and his team that they are not going to win this election unless they come up with a progressive agenda that speaks to the needs of the working class of this country.”

Sanders’ warning comes at a critical time in American politics. On Monday, Republicans in Iowa will gather for caucuses that mark the official start of the 2024 presidential election.

Biden faces no serious challenger in the Democratic primaries. But concern is mounting over how he would fare against Trump given a likely rematch between them in November.

  • @cmbabul
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    16510 months ago

    I voted for Bernie and he would have been great, I always find myself thinking about Gore winning more often. I have more respect for Bernie for sure but we’d have been in such a better place by 2016. Jesus, there’s a non-zero chance that the 9/11 warnings don’t get ignored and the US definitely doesn’t invade Iraq or Afghanistan. The housing bubble would probably still have burst in a bad way but I doubt it goes down the same way. Supreme Court wouldn’t be as full of neocons and zealots.

    • Dark Arc
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      5610 months ago

      Not just that if Gore had won and 9-11 would have still happened we would have likely seen a push away from oil starting in the early 2000s. I think Gore could’ve turned that into an opportunity to say “to hell with these middle east authoritarians and their oil, we can do better for ourselves and better for the planet.”

      Unfortunately I was 6 when 9-11 happened so I didn’t have much say in these matters.

      • DominusOfMegadeus
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        2310 months ago

        Gore would have been a timeline-changer. I would vote for him now. I wonder if he’s a viable candidate at this point?

      • FlashMobOfOne
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        1610 months ago

        If nothing else, I’m fairly sure Gore would have actually read his intelligence briefings.

    • @Candelestine
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      4810 months ago

      Yeah, this was always my big one too. I’m a green at heart, but I learned a brutal lesson then, that I’ll carry inside of me forever. A lesson that has only gotten reinforced by the slow march of modern fascism.

      Democracy requires dialogue, patience, empathy and compromise. The alternative is authoritarianism, and the unavoidable power struggles that come from too much centralized power in a world with ambitious humans. We need to remember that, and dialogue and compromise with our, in many ways younger-self progressives, instead of trying to corral them. We can do this. We are not too afraid.

      Give em hell Bernie.

    • @Coach
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      1910 months ago

      Ugh…you’re 1000% right. That timeline sounds wonderful.

    • @captainlezbian
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      1710 months ago

      Yeah I think with gore we’d’ve had a good chance of being the world leader in switching to green energy right around when hummers got popular instead.

    • FlashMobOfOne
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      610 months ago

      His EO’s alone would have accomplished more in one term than any Dem since LBJ.

    • @AngryCommieKender
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      410 months ago

      Fix the whole last century and just assassinate Wilson in 1911-1912 before the damn election.

    • Rhaedas
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      310 months ago

      It’s possible we’d be in a better situation now. Lots of obvious things like not tossing out known facts about terrorism efforts and having a climate change awareness leadership. There’s much that would still be the same, like the system of consumerism that is the core of much of our problems. One person in a limited power seat can’t fix that, I’m not sure anything can outside of failure of the system itself. But I do think we would have at least avoided that one historic turning point that revved back up the military drive of the US. Even GWB’s administration was looking into ways of reducing the military into smaller, more mobile parts until suddenly we went into revenge mode. Or useful crisis mode.

    • @rayyy
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      110 months ago

      I always find myself thinking about Gore winning more often.

      We might be thinking about Biden winning his second term as Nazis take over the US in the future - Get your friends to vote