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Famous Like Me > Actor > S > Bernie Sanders

Profile of Bernie Sanders on Famous Like Me

 
Name: Bernie Sanders  
   
Also Know As:
   
Date of Birth: 8th September 1941
   
Place of Birth: Brooklyn, New York, USA
   
Profession: Actor
 
 
From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia
Bernie Sanders at a press conference on the cost of fuel.

Bernard ("Bernie") Sanders (born September 8, 1941) has been a member of the United States House of Representatives since 1991 as the at-large congressman from Vermont. He is an independent, but caucuses with the Democrats and is counted as a Democrat for the purposes of committee assignments. He is the only independent member of the House, and is one of very few self-described democratic socialists elected to federal office in the United States in recent times. He is currently serving his eighth two-year term, and is giving up his House seat to pursue the Senate seat currently occupied by Jim Jeffords, who is retiring at the end of his current term in 2007. (See Possible replacements for Jim Jeffords).

Biography

The son of a Polish immigrant, Sanders was born in Brooklyn and educated at Brooklyn College and the University of Chicago. He has lived in Vermont since 1964. He was a member of the anti-Vietnam War Liberty Union Party, and in the 1970s ran for governor and senator four times. Sanders is married to the former Dr. Jane O'Meara, president of Burlington College, and they have four children.

Early political career

In 1981, at the suggestion of a friend who was a philosophy professor at the University of Vermont, Sanders ran for mayor of Burlington and defeated a six-term Democratic incumbent by 12 votes. Increasingly popular because of his successful revitalization of the downtown area, he won three more terms, defeating Democratic and Republican candidates. In his last run for mayor, in 1987, he defeated a candidate endorsed by both major parties.

During his first term, supporters of Sanders formed the Progressive Coalition, forerunner of Vermont's Progressive Party. The Progressives never held more than six seats on the 13-member city council, but it was enough to keep the council from overriding Sanders' vetoes. Under Sanders, Burlington became the first city in the country to fund community-trust housing. His administration also sued the local cable provider and won considerably reduced rates and a substantial cash settlement.

Sanders ran for governor in 1986. He finished third with 14.5% of the vote, which was enough to deny incumbent Democrat Madeleine Kunin a majority; she was elected by the state legislature. In 1988 when six-term incumbent Jeffords made a successful run for the Senate, Sanders ran for the open seat and narrowly lost to Peter Smith, the former lieutenant governor and the Republican candidate for governor two years earlier. He sought a rematch against Smith in 1990. In one of the biggest upsets in recent political history, he took 56 percent of the vote and defeated Smith by 16 points, becoming the first independent member of the House since 1950.

House of Representative election record

Sanders has been reelected six times and is the longest-serving independent member of the House. Despite his independent status, he has only faced one difficult contest. That came in 1994, in the midst of a huge Republican wave that saw that party take control of the House. In a year where marginal seats fell to Republicans left and right, Sanders managed a narrow 3-point victory. In every other election, he has never failed to win less than 55 percent of the vote. Most recently, in 2004, Sanders took 69% to Republican Greg Parke's 24% and Democrat Larry Drown's 7%. He has often received significant support from Republicans.

Relations with rest of House

Although relations between Sanders and House Democratic leadership have not always been smooth, the Democrats have not actively campaigned against Sanders since his first run for Congress. While Democratic candidates have run against him in every election except 1994 (when Sanders managed to win the Democrats' endorsement), they have received scant financial support. He has endorsed every Democratic candidate for president of the United States since 1992.

Sanders is a co-founder of the House Progressive Caucus and chaired the grouping of mostly left-leaning Democratic congressmen for its first eight years.

Sanders voted against the resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq in the fall of 2002 and opposed the subsequent invasion. He later joined almost all of his colleagues in voting for a non-binding resolution expressing support for U.S. troops at the outset of the invasion, although he gave a floor speech blasting the partisan nature of the resolution and the Bush administration's actions in the run-up to the war.

On the domestic front, Sanders supports universal health care and opposes foreign trade agreements which, he says, deprive American workers of their jobs while exploiting foreign workers in sweat-shop factories. An amendment he offered in 2005 to limit provisions giving the government power to obtain individuals' library and book-buying records passed the House by a significant bi-partisan majority, giving President Bush a rare and major legislative defeat and marking the first rejection of any section of the USA PATRIOT Act. His lifetime legislative score from the AFL-CIO is 100%. In contrast, as of 2004, he has a grade of "F" from the National Rifle Association. Nevertheless, in October 2005 Sanders voted in favor of an NRA-sponsored bill to restrict lawsuits against gun manufacturers.

Campaign for Senate

Sanders had mentioned on several occasions that he would run for the Senate if Jeffords, a longtime friend, ever retired. When Jeffords announced on April 21, 2005 that he would not seek a fourth term in 2006, Sanders wasted little time in formally jumping into the race.

Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, immediately endorsed Sanders. Schumer's backing was critical, as it likely means that any Democrat running against Sanders cannot expect to receive significant financial backing. He was also endorsed by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean (a former governor of Vermont and presidential candidate in 2004) and other leading Democrats. Dean said in May that he considered Sanders an ally who voted with House Democrats.

Sanders is heavily favored to win election to the Senate in 2006, especially after Republican governor Jim Douglas, widely believed to be the only Republican who could possibly defeat him, decided against a Senate run. A poll conducted for WCAX-TV, the CBS affiliate in Burlington, showed Sanders leading the only Republicans who have thus far expressed interest in the race--businessman Richard Tarrant and Lieutenant Governor Brian Dubie--by substantial margins.

According to the leftist magazine In These Times, "Judging from his popularity, Sanders' election is all but assured. If he takes office, he will become the Senate's most progressive member."

This content from Wikipedia is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Bernie Sanders