Sanders urges Clinton to step up on trade

Sen. Bernie Sanders on Sunday stepped up his call for Hillary Clinton to take a stand on the trade legislation that he does not support.

“Corporate America and Wall Street are going to bring that bill back to the House next week,” Sanders said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “I would hope very much that Secretary Clinton will side with every union in this country, virtually every environment group, many religious groups, and say that this TPP policy is a disaster, that it must be defeated and that we need to regroup and come up with a trade policy that demands corporate America starts investing in this country.”


Sanders, an independent from Vermont who is vying with Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination, also cited Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a progressive who Clinton has consulted on economic issues, in rejecting the trade legislation.

“I would hope that the secretary joins Elizabeth Warren … and the vast majority of Democrats in the Congress in saying, ‘No, we got to defeat this legislation,’ ” he said.

Sanders also listed policies, other than trade, where he hopes to differentiate himself from others in the Democratic presidential field, including climate change and his votes against the Iraq War and the Patriot Act.

But he said: “The bottom line is, the American people want leadership to take on the billionaire class, represent the middle class.”

“People will have to judge the secretary’s role in that process,” he said.

Sanders also insisted that the upswing in interest in his campaign is not a fluke, but rather, “people want us to stand up, fight back.”

“That is why we’re drawing large crowds,” he said.