Jill Stein Says Bernie Should Go Green
Bernie Sanders left his meeting with President Obama on Thursday, vowing to support Secretary Clinton, in an effort to keep Donald Trump from the White House.
Dr. Jill Stein, however, the front-runner in the race for the Green Party nomination, believes that this choice would be an abandonment of the “political revolution” that Sanders has led and fueled throughout the year. In an interview Thursday with Democracy Now!, Stein, a self-described “physician, not politician,” discussed her reasoning behind why Sanders should join the Green Party ticket.
The “Democratic machine,” as she calls it, has actively worked to pull votes away from grassroots campaigns. According to Stein, the Democratic Party actively works to sabotage candidates that they do not support.
Through the existence of superdelegates, smear campaigns, lack of an adequate debate schedule, and the outright support of the DNC for Hillary Clinton, Stein believes that the Democratic Party is creating a handicap for anyone who colors outside the lines.
This is why she believes Sanders should continue to lead his revolution with the Green Party, where votes from Sanders supporters would finally count. Stein believes that Democratic voters’ rights are being violated through the underground work of the DNC and believes that voters would get proper representation within the Green Party, where she thinks the revolution could thrive.
READ MORE: Jill Stein: The Entire Political System Disempowers Voters — Not Just Primaries
Stein says that while the Democratic Party boasts a liberal and progressive agenda, it is moving toward the right, steadily becoming “more corporatist, more militarist, and more imperialist. This is why we say it’s hard to have a revolutionary campaign inside of a counterrevolutionary party.”
Sanders has not responded to invitations from the Green Party that began in 2011 and continue today. Considering his previous statements against running as a third-party candidate, for fear that a Republican would be elected by splitting the Democratic vote, it is highly unlikely that Sanders will go green.