Senator Bernie Sanders said recently that his current goal is showing the American working class that "their problems are not caused by some Mexican making eight dollars an hour picking strawberries."

In an interview with New Yorker reporter Benjamin Wallace-Wells published recently, Sanders said that he has encountered a lot of "despair" on his recent travels to rural parts of the US.

Over the last several months, the Vermont senator and one-time presidential candidate has been actively touring traditionally conservative states such as West Virginia and Kentucky, as well as swing states like Ohio, to talk about how the goals of the Democratic Party could help low-income, rural Americans.

"There is a lot of pain. And we’ve got to understand that reality," Sanders said in the interview. "And then tell these people that their problems are not caused by some Mexican making eight dollars an hour picking strawberries."

Even though Sanders identifies as Independent, he said he hopes to convince low-income people in rural communities that the values of the Democratic National Committee could help communities dealing with problems like the opioid epidemic and a lack of jobs that pay liveable wages.

In an April interview with MSNBC's Chris Hayes, Sanders said that too many in the DNC spent far too much time appeasing billionaires and the ultra-rich to win the trust of poor and rural Americans.

Democrats will not be able to win an election unless they "have the guts to point the finger at the ruling class of this country," he told Hayes in April.