Around New England

Bernie Sanders Wins Endorsement of Large Left-Wing Group — Over Elizabeth Warren

December 23, 2019

Vermont U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders won a major endorsement by an organization claiming to represent more than 1 million progressives in early voting states.

The Democratic Socialist and 2020 presidential candidate earned the backing of People’s Action, a coalition of 40 progressive groups throughout the country, as The Hill reported Thursday, December 19.

The coalition supported Sanders over a fellow New England progressive, Massachusetts Senator U.S. Elizabeth Warren.

“We were really struck by the fact that for the last few decades, this guy has been able to see through the haze of a neoliberal worldview that has affected so many parts of American life,” George Goehl, national director of People’s Action, told Politico. “We also think he’s uniquely positioned to win. He’s already stitched together a multiracial, urban, rural, multi-generational campaign.”

Sanders overwhelmingly won the vote for the endorsement among People’s Act, earning votes from 74 percent of the delegates.

Additionally, South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, California U.S. Senator Kamala Harris, and former United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro filled out the organization’s questionnaire, seeking their endorsement. (Harris subsequently dropped out of the race.)

The issues that made the difference for the group were Sanders’s support for national rent control and his plan to build 10 million below-market-rate housing units nationally.

“People’s Action is one of the great grassroots organizations in this country,” Sanders said in a statement following the endorsement, according to Politico. “I am just so proud and excited to have the endorsement of People’s Action because they understand what I understand:  That at the end of the day, the only way we make real change in this country is through grassroots activism.”

According to Reason, Sanders’ housing plan would cost $2.5 trillion over 10 years.

People’s Action has members in early voting states like Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada as well as some Super Tuesday states.

Nationally, Sanders is polling second behind Joe Biden, according to the RealClearPolitics polling average. 

Sanders also recently got a major endorsement from the Center for Popular Democracy which features more than 600,000 members, according to The Washington Times.