Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said the “scariest times” of his life are now, during the Trump administration, claiming there is “a movement toward authoritarianism” sweeping across the country.
“It is not just they want to give tax breaks to billionaires and cut programs for working people. Frankly, that’s happened before,” the Vermont progressive said of Republicans on Pod Save America.
“You combine that with the power of the oligarchy in general, you combine that with Mr. Musk owning Twitter and able to send out his messages to hundreds of millions of people,” the Vermont senator continued, claiming that Musk serves as one of the biggest impediments to what the Hill called “progressivism and economic justice.”
He also said that Amazon founder and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos’s changing the editorial outlook of the Post as another sign.
“You combine that with the fact that people like Bezos, the second-wealthiest person in the country, fired or got rid of most of his editorial staff and turning it into a right-wing thing,” as Bezos has sought to refocus the outlet’s opinion section to discuss personal liberties and free markets.
“Trump is suing major media outlets and is threatening to investigate PBS and NPR. So it’s not only the power of money, it’s also combined with that the movement toward authoritarianism,” Sanders continued.
“When you have the vice president saying, well, in his judgment the courts don’t have the right to stop unconstitutional acts of the president, man, that is authoritarianism. He is now trying to end what the Founding Fathers was [sic] pretty smart about, creating a form of government where there were checks and balances,” Sanders remarked.
“That is a scary moment,” he added.
Sean Moran is a policy reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on X @SeanMoran3.
