Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) discussed the impact of identity politics on the Democratic Party and the progressive movement in an interview with Trevor Noah on his podcast, “What Now?” “Democrats have retreated from class issues, from economic issues, from a desire to take on big money to, ‘Oh, isn’t it wonderful we have a woman here and we have a gay person here and we have a black person here and a Latino person over there,'” Sanders said. “So for a myriad of reasons, some of which we have discussed, the Democrats have chosen to say, isn’t it great we have a woman this, we have a gay that, black that. Rather than saying, hey, we got an economy that works for all of us, not just the few,” Sanders told Noah.

TREVOR NOAH: You said something a while ago that has stuck with me for years, actually. And it was in and around one of the elections. You were talking about how people should campaign. And you said, and I’ll paraphrase you, forgive me, but you said something to the effect of, we need to stop focusing so much on basically selling it as a race issue and selling it more as a living wage issue, as a survivability issue. And I remember at the time, some people didn’t get what you were saying. People were like, no, but this is a race thing. And it’s funny because it took me back to some of the things that happened in and around the civil rights movement, whether it was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., et cetera, who said basically that, oh, poor doesn’t know a color. Do you think that that’s been some of the problem in the way politics, especially in the Democratic Party? It feels like a lot of the Democrats who go out there will spend a lot of time being like, black people, come on, you’re good. You’re black and Latinos, Latinos, but they don’t seem to go into the heart of what the issues are. SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): And that’s not an accident. Okay. So you have, what’s his name? I can’t remember his name now…. To answer your question, what you’re talking about is identity politics. Okay. So we are so proud that for the first time, we have a judge from this state who is black, Latino, Asian, you name it. We have a woman this, we have a gay that. That is, look, all of us want to see parts of our society have good representation in Congress and we’re making some progress. Donald Trump has surrounding him a whole lot of women. There are right-wing women governors all over this country, right? Are we all very proud? Oh man, thank God we got a woman in politics who does not believe in women’s right to control her own body, who is terrible to workers and so on, but we’re proud that she’s a woman. The issue is, and this is what I meant earlier, Democrats have retreated from class issues, from economic issues, from a desire to take on big money to, oh, isn’t it wonderful we have a woman here and we have a gay person here and we have a black person here and a Latino person over there. And King, you remember, now, when you hear how old I am, I was in Washington for the March on Washington, King’s March on Washington. I heard Dr. King speak. You know what that march was called? It was called, if my memory is correct, Jobs and Freedom. Jobs and Freedom. Jobs actually went first. King understood that exactly as you described it, what good, and he would, this is what he said. He said, what does it matter if a restaurant which was segregated is opened up if you don’t have enough money to afford the damn hamburger, right?… You can’t afford the rent. So for a myriad of reasons, some of which we have discussed, the Democrats have chosen to say, isn’t it great we have a woman this, we have a gay that. Black that. Rather than saying, hey, we got an economy that works for all of us, not just the few. That all of our people are earning a living wage. All of our people have health care. All of our kids, regardless of color, are able to get a good quality education. That together, we’re taking on climate change and creating jobs to save the planet for all of us. So to some degree, look, it goes without saying, there has been discrimination, as everybody knows, bigotry all over the place. And we’ve got to fight that every day. We’ve got to open up the process to all of our people. But it’s not just that somebody is a woman candidate or a gay candidate.

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