Top 833 Quotes & Sayings by Bernie Sanders - Page 10

The billionaires and their super PACs increasingly control the American political process. This is not democracy. This is not what brave Americans fought and died to defend. This is oligarchy. This is government of the few, by the few and for the few. We must overturn Citizen United and move to public funding of elections.

Health care in America must be a right, not a privilege.

There are many major crises facing our country. At the top of the list is the need to overturn Citizens United. If billionaires are able to buy elections and elect right-wing candidates, there is no way we will ever address climate change, college education, affordability, job creation, raising the minimum wage and taking on Wall Street.

Your story is for - voting for every disastrous trade agreement, and voting for corporate America. Did I vote against the Wall Street bailout?

The American people want to raise the minimum wage. Every poll tells us that. That bill will not get to the floor of the Senate. The American people want to ask the rich to pay more in taxes. But the legislation that will get to the floor is tax breaks for billionaires.

In and out of government, I've always been willing to take on complicated, sometimes unpopular, issues and work them through to have a solution.

When I was a young boy, I can remember in the community that I grew up in, seeing people in the community who had numbers that were on their arms.

When a mother has a baby, she should stay home with that baby.

If there is a large voter turnout, not only do we retain the White House, but I think we regain the Senate. We win governors' chairs up and down the line. So I believe if you want to retain the White House, if you want to see Democrats do well across the board, I think our campaign is the one that creates the large voter turnout and helps us win.

At a time of massive inequality, I think we can raise substantial sums of revenue to address the needs of working families, the elderly, and the children, by asking those people who are doing phenomenally well to start paying their fair share.

This is what income inequality means in America, and why the gap between the very rich and everyone else is growing wider. According to a recent study, CEO pay is now 295 times more than the pay of a typical worker. In 1965, the differential was 20 times. We must create an economy that works for all, not just the top 1%.

A number of years ago, people were saying normal relationship with Cuba, what a bad and silly idea. They're Communists, they are our enemy. Well guess what? Change has come.

What the Supreme Court did in Citizens United is to say to these same billionaires and the corporations they control: 'You own and control the economy, you own Wall Street, you own the coal companies, you own the oil companies. Now, for a very small percentage of your wealth, we're going to give you the opportunity to own the United States Government.' This is the essence of what Citizens United is all about - and that's why it must be overturned.

Given the fact that poverty is growing, more and more Americans are losing health insurance, health care costs are going up, the middle class is shrinking, the gap between the rich and the poor is growing wider. That speaks to the weakness of the opposition. People do not like George W. Bush. But I think it's fair to say that they are not flocking to the Democratic Party, or see the Democrats as a real alternative.

If elected president I will have a litmus test in terms of my nominee to be a Supreme Court justice. And the nominee will say, we are going to overturn this disastrous decision on Citizens United because that decision is undermining American democracy. I do not believe that billionaires should be allowed to buy politicians.

Country must confront what he called institutional racism. [We should] create a country which provides economic, social and environmental justice for all.

Don`t take it out on the Muslims. Don`t take it out on Latinos. Try to help us work together to create a country where your kids and you can have a decent standard of living. It has to be a bold and radical agenda.

[Hillary] Clinton is too much into regime change and a little bit too aggressive without knowing what the unintended consequences might be. Yes, we could get rid of Assad tomorrow, but that would create another political vacuum that would benefit ISIS.

I do believe that in the future, not by dismantling what we have here - I helped write that bill - but by moving forward, rallying the American people, I do believe we should have health care for all.

People are tired of working longer hours for lower wages, of seeing decent paying jobs go to China and other low-wage countries, of billionaires not paying any federal income taxes and of not being able to afford a college education for their kids - all while the very rich become much richer.

I do not accept the belief that the United States of America and our government can't stand up to the ripoffs of the pharmaceutical industry which charge us by far the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs.

I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, and I'm concerned that voting for this [anti-terrorism] legislation fundamentally violates that oath.

I am not supportive of large multi-national corporations that made billions a year in profit and don't pay a nickel in taxes, nor am I supportive of those corporations who throw American workers out on the street and then move to China or Mexico.

The last point that I'd make. I had a hearing. I had all of the veterans groups in front of me. And I said to them, tell me when a veteran gets in to the V.A., understanding there are waiting lines and real problems, when a veteran gets into the system, is the quality of care good?

If you look at our records, I stood up to corporate America time and time again. I went to Mexico. I saw the lives of people who were working in American factories and making $0.25 an hour.

I fully, fully concede that Secretary Hillary Clinton, who was secretary of State for four years, has more experience - hat is not arguable - in foreign affairs.

But on the other hand, there are many corporations who have turned their backs on the American worker, who have said, if I can make another nickel in profit by going to China and shutting down in the United States of America, that's what I will do.

The hardest thing about going to college should not be paying for it.

Ben Carson and I don`t have much in common politically. But the fact is when you have kids getting involved in the political process, doing their best to elect the candidates of their choice, that`s what the American democracy is about.

The Cold War is over. And our focus has got to be on intelligence, increased manpower, fighting internationally targets.

I'm interested in - in that his power, if that is the word, is such that he has actually been able to be in a way a one-man wrecking crew in the area of deportment and how one proceeds politically on the stump. Marco Rubio is - is attempting, as you know, to a - to give [Donald] Trump a fight in Trump's own style. I'm not sure how that works, but - but certainly the indices are good.

You all remember how many years ago, we were younger, it was uppity women who are trying to take our jobs as men. It was those gay people who wanted to make everybody homosexual in our school system. It was Blacks wanted to take white jobs. That's what demagoguery is about. It is to obfuscate the real problems facing our society and find somebody you can blame and rally the American people.

If you`re a Republican politician and you`re seeing this guy [Donald Trump] saying crazy stuff and going up in the polls, what are you going to say, you`re going to say equally crazy or maybe a little less crazy stuff.

Wish we could, and allow the Taliban or anybody else to reclaim that country. But what we must do is some progress in Iraq, where finally the Iraqi army, which has not been a particularly effective fighting force, retook Ramadi.

What this [presidency] campaign is about this bringing millions of people jobs in this country.

All that I can say is that we are spending far more per capita than people in any other country, and our health care outcomes are in many cases worse in terms of life expectancy, infant mortality and so forth.

Vermont is such a small state, and the most money that's ever been spent in the history of political campaigns there is $2 million. That number is going to be surpassed many times. Vermont remains a "cheap state" for the Republican National Committee. So putting $5 or $10 million into Vermont - compared to New York or California or Illinois - that's small potatoes.

You can't become a billionaire stepping over children sleeping on the street.

Do not tell me that I have not shown courage in standing up to the gun people, in voting to ban assault weapons, voting for instant background checks, voting to end the gun show loophole and now in a position to create a consensus in America on gun safety.

I believe strongly that we can protect our people without undermining our constitutional rights and I worry very, very much about the huge attacks on privacy that we have seen in recent years - both from the government and the private sector. I worry that we are moving toward an Orwellian society, and this is something I will oppose as vigorously as I can.

I have friends and supporters in the Human Rights Fund and Planned Parenthood. Hillary Clinton has been around there for a very, very long time. Some of these groups are, in fact, part of the establishment.

If people envisage me in the Senate they might think of me as someone who would emulate Paul Wellstone, fighting for the issues he fought for. He was a good friend of mine. We'll be trying to do a couple of things. One is fighting for national health care. Another is fighting to raise the minimum wage to a living wage, and changing our trade policies.

I worry very much about kids growing up in a society where they think: "I'm not going to talk about this issue, read this book or explore this idea because someone may think I'm a terrorist." That's not the kind of free society I want for our children.

Every three weeks before an election the TV ads expressing great concern about our trade policy and the loss of jobs to China and other low-wage countries. And then it's forgotten about the day after the election.

I happen to believe that certain types of assault weapons, which are manufactured and designed for military purposes to kill people very quickly should not be used in civilian society.

I've lost six different times. You can't say, 'Well, he lost, that's the end of the world.' You have to say, 'Okay, you lost, what did we do wrong?

It's no great secret, number one, in my view, and I think the view of most Americans, that Congress itself is pretty dysfunctional. We are not addressing the real needs of the American people. And second of all, philosophically, there is a huge division between the House and the Senate.

I think if we're looking at lasting peace in the Middle East, the United States has got to respect the needs of the Palestinian people. They cannot be pushed aside.

When you have kids that have no jobs and are not in school, too often they get themselves into trouble. So what we have got to do is invest in education and in jobs, something which I have fought for, rather than more jails and incarceration.

We are not going back. We are not returning to the days of back-room abortions, when countless women died or were maimed. The decision about abortion must remain a decision for the woman, her family and a physician to make, not the government.

We have to enforce the individual mandate. We're losing a lot of money that is not coming into the system.

The issue is to trying to figure out why we end up spending so much more than other countries.

Charles Kernaghan is a legitimate American hero... Through his determination he has forced the leadership in our country and many other countries around the world to pay attention. Kernaghan has done more to expose child labor than has the whole Department of Labor that has a budget of hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars, because he has the guts and determination to do it.

It means joining with allies to deploy renewable energy technologies -- both at home and around the world -- to confront the very real and present danger of potentially irreversible climate change.

All of you are aware of the tragic history of racism in America, but for a very long time, African-Americans and their white allies came together and they struggled and they stood up for justice and they stood up to lynching and they stood up to segregation and the stood up to a nation where African-Americans couldn't even vote in America.

I`m a former mayor. I know that being a cop is not an easy job. But when police officers misbehave, they`ve got to be held accountable.

For some reason, we can't go to Cuba, businesses in American can't do business in Cuba. I think that that is stupid. So I hope very much and applaud the president for his efforts in that direction and hope that in the not-too-distant future, that if I have anything to say about it as president, we will work aggressively to develop normal relations in every respect with the people of Cuba.

I did a lot of reading. I read about democratic socialism. And I read about the efforts of people for such a long time trying to create a society in which all people can live with dignity. And that's kind of what I believe.

I want some help on this. I'm being very honest, i want some ideas, as somebody who was arrested 50 years ago fighting for Civil Rights trying to desegregate schools in Chicago, who spent his whole life fighting against racism, I want your ideas. What do you think we can do? What can we do?

Ever since [Donald]Trump has been opening his big mouth, you`re seeing all these bitter people, latent racists who are becoming emboldened. You`re seeing some ugly stuff happening around this country.