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‘Good!’ Says Sanders as Lobbyists Lash Out at Proposal to End Corporate Domination of US Politics

Sen. Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign late Monday enthusiastically welcomed lobbyist backlash over the senator’s new proposal to dramatically curb the power of corporate money in politics and bar the Democratic National Committee from taking cash from big business.

“Good!” Sanders tweeted in response to a story in The Hill that quoted several lobbyists opposed to the senator’s plan, which would ban corporate donations to the Democratic Party Convention in Milwaukee if Sanders becomes the presidential nominee. As Politico reported last month, Democratic operatives have already begun seeking lobbyist help with financing the event.

Stewart Verdery, CEO of public affairs firm Monument Advocacy, warned that “telling companies who would like to partner with the party to take their ball and go home will easily feed into an anti-capitalist motif.”

“On the substance side, hosting a convention is a major endeavor that can strap the budgets of parties and cities—the money has to come from somewhere and cutting off corporate donations may further depress interest in hosting a convention,” said Verdery. “On the image side, the Democrats always have to balance their populist rhetoric with quieter outreach to the business community.”

The Hill also granted anonymity to a Democratic lobbyist who bashed Sanders’s proposal as a “desperate” attempt to outdo Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-Mass.) anti-corruption plan.

“This is simply a game of one-upmanship from a desperate campaign that doesn’t have the ability to draft a 27-page thesis like Warren,” said the lobbyist.

The Sanders campaign—which proudly touts a list of “anti-endorsements” on its website—was unmoved by the lobbyists’ criticism. In fact, as deputy campaign manager Ari Rabin-Havt put it, lobbyist outrage over the proposal “is not a bug—it’s a feature.”

Warren Gunnels, Sanders’s senior adviser, tweeted: “We welcome their hatred.”

‘Maddening’ Graphic Shows How 400 Richest Americans Paid Less In Taxes Than Any Other Income Group

For the first time in U.S. history, the 400 wealthiest Americans paid less in taxes last year than people in any other income group, thanks to decades of tax cuts and loopholes benefiting the rich.

A year after the Republican tax plan—often called the #GOPTaxScam by critics—was passed into law, the richest people in the country were subject to a 23 percent rate in local, state, and federal taxes.

As New York Times columnist David Leonhardt showed Sunday in a graphic accompanying his op-ed, “The Rich Really Do Pay Lower Taxes Than You,” the tax rate wealthy Americans are forced to pay has plummeted over the last seven decades while middle-income households have paid roughly the same share of their incomes each year.

In 1950, rich Americans paid 70 percent of their income in taxes—a system that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has suggested returning to, drawing derision from conservatives. By 1980, the 400 wealthiest people paid 47 percent of their incomes in taxes.

Leonhardt called the trend “maddening.”

“Over the last 75 years the United States tax system has become radically less progressive,” Leonhardt wrote.

Meet the Hawkish Liberal Think Tank Powering the Kamala Harris Campaign

If you liked Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy, you can keep it.

That’s the message many Democratic voters are receiving this election, as they prepare to pick a contender from the gradually winnowing field of candidates to take on Donald Trump in 2020. And the reason is the continuing influence of a think-tank called the Center for a New American Security (CNAS).

The influence of CNAS on the 2020 election, at this point, is being channeled through the campaign of Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), who has drawn heavily from its ranks to fill her line-up of foreign policy advisors. But given its status as the go-to fountainhead of Democratic foreign policy ideas, there is every chance its alumni could be part of another future Democratic administration.

Founded on the eve of what was thought to almost certainly be a coming Clinton presidency over a decade ago, CNAS has left its fingerprints all over the past ten years of Democratic foreign policy. With its bipartisan make-up and centrist approach, the think tank has served as a crucial wellspring for conventional foreign policy thinking that has shaped the actions and ideas of both the Obama administration and Clinton’s 2016 run.

Even as the American public has slowly turned against endless war, CNAS’ prescriptions have stayed soothingly familiar: Stay the course in ongoing wars, step up efforts to counter Russia, China and other adversaries, and dig deeper into the conflicts the United States has so far only dipped a toe into.

Though Clinton’s loss meant CNAS hasn’t had the influence over the halls of power it expected, a wide-open Democratic contest means a second opportunity. And it seems California Sen. Kamala Harris is its favored candidate, as her foreign policy advisory team is stocked with the think tank’s alumni and its co-founder.

Bernie Sanders Is Spoiling for a Fight With the DNC

A few weeks ago, two Democratic Party officials toured K Street shops to explain how lobbyists can donate to the 2020 Democratic Party convention in Milwaukee. Politico obtained documents showing that, for example, $300,000 gets you VIP credentials and glitzy skyboxes towering above the convention floor.

In 2016, seventeen donors ponied up three-quarters of the Democratic National Convention’s funding, with many corporate sponsors (including Facebook, Bank of America, and Comcast) donating over $1 million apiece. More than a few of those donors also shelled out for the Republican National Convention, sending a clear message: whoever wins, we expect our interests to be represented going forward. Otherwise, you can kiss our money goodbye.

Today, Bernie Sanders threw down the gauntlet on corporate sponsorship of the convention. He released a multipoint plan to get corporate money out of politics. Its very first stipulation: “As the Democratic nominee, Bernie will ban corporate contributions to the Democratic Party Convention and all related committees.”

If Sanders is set to clinch the nomination heading into the convention, he will have increased — which is not to say total, given the forces arrayed against him — leverage over the party. His new statement indicates that he plans on using that influence to shape the nature of the convention itself, striving to create what his national policy director Josh Orton called “a people-powered convention,” instead of a spectacle literally watched over by the megarich and their lackeys.

The DNC, for its part, is adamant that it will not return the money it has raised from lobbyists and corporate PACs, nor break its promises of exclusive access and credentials in exchange for cash. If Sanders were the frontrunner, the result would be a tug-of-war between the nominee and the establishment apparatus over the role of corporate interests at the convention. With this proposal, Sanders shows that he’s spoiling for that fight.

‘It Was Like A Rallying Cry’: Bernie Sanders Campaign Surges Ahead After Heart Attack

Less than a week after suffering a heart attack, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) addressed hundreds of campaign staffers on Monday afternoon to offer his gratitude for their work and assure them he is more committed than ever to winning the Democratic presidential nomination.

“Ironically, I will tell you that I feel more strongly about the need for a political revolution today than I did when I began,” he said, according to the campaign.

The mood amongst the staffers who were on the brief call was boisterous, according to three people who were on the call who requested anonymity to speak without authorization.

One of the campaign aides described being moved by Sanders’ reminder that their campaign — which boasts the slogan, “Not me. Us.” — was about the hopes and dreams of millions of working people seeking a better life.

“You work so fucking hard on these things, that it’s good to hear the person you work for have this really kind of humbling approach to it all,” the aide said. “He said ‘Don’t take your eye off the ball’ in a way that really got people moving.”

The call embodied the broader response that the campaign has had since Sanders was hospitalized late Tuesday night with chest pain that ended up being a “myocardial infarction,” or heart attack: That Sanders is well on his way back to full health, that his fight for Medicare for All is more personal than ever, and that he has no plans to slow down his campaign.

“The working class Americans who are the core of Bernie’s movement wake up each day and battle adversity of all kinds, and we believe they will be drawn even closer to the senator as he continues to fight for a shared vision to transform our country so it works for all of us – not just the wealthy and well-connected,” Sanders campaign manager Faiz Shakir said in a statement on Monday.