Tuesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Jeff Weaver, the former campaign manager for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) 2016 Democratic presidential bid, credited Sanders with making certain issues once considered to be “fringe” issues as “articles of faith” for the modern Democratic Party.
“I think if you look across the country, in terms of grassroots activism from one end of this country to another — I think a lot of that started in our campaign in 2016,” Weaver said. “There’s obviously been a lot of other influences — women’s movement, immigrant movement, immigrants’ right movement that sort of became activated under the Trump presidency. But I think you saw a sort of spark of this on the campaign.”
“But I would also say on the policy side — you know when Bernie started, he was at 3 percent, 4 percent, 5 percent,” he continued. “And he was talking about things like free public college. He was talking about universal health care. He was talking about a $15 minimum wage. Those are articles of faith in the Democratic Party now, and they were considered out on the fringe at the beginning of that campaign.”
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