25 Things You May Not Know About Bernie Sanders

[LiberalArkie]

*Bernie Sanders entered into politics through the civil rights movement, more than a half century ago. He organized with CORE (the Congress of Racial Equality) in Chicago, and led a sit-in against segregated housing as far back as 1962.

*According to John Nichols of The Nation, Sanders is one of only 2 sitting U.S. Senators who actually attended the 1963 March on Washington, and saw Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., give his “I Have A Dream” speech in person. (The other is Mitch McConnell, believe it or not...) At the time, Sanders was an organizer for SNCC (the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee).

*Bernie Sanders is one of the only elected White officeholders who endorsed Jesse Jackson for President (twice!). In 1984, he got slapped at a rally when he endorsed Jackson (though the slap was probably for remaining an Independent Socialist, rather than a Democrat). In 1988, Sanders and his organizers helped Jackson win a surprise victory in the Vermont caucuses--by one state delegate. In Jesse’s memorable phrase, Bernie Sanders & Jim Hightower were among the few elected White officeholders brave enough to “cross the color line” to support him when it mattered.

*Born in Brooklyn, Sanders moved to Vermont in the early 1970s, and worked as a writer for alternative newspapers and as a carpenter. He became a leader of the Liberty Union Party in Vermont, an alternative third party that fiercely opposed the war in Vietnam and stood for reform of the marijuana laws.

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