brothers and sisters want to churn out thank you so much for being here isn't seem true but we began this campaign oh about three and a half months ago and the momentum has been unbelievable twelve thousand people here you know the media yesterday they say well what's going on why do so many people come out why do you have more in the vidual campaign contributors than any other campaign only lasts we did we have thirty seven hundred organizational meetings all across this country four hundred thousand people owned the answer is pretty simple the and so for white people all right so you go up is that all across this country people are sick and tired of a stop wish been politics establishment old people of america understand that corporate greed is fish royale country that american politics is now dominated by big money interests and that much of the mainstream media is prepared to talk about everything except that is what is most  and the other point that i want to make an opening is to tell you that this campaign differs from any other campaign because i will be very honest with you and tell you what you tell you and that is no president can do it alone no one person in the white house can take on wall street corporate america let me just say a brief word now because you've heard a lot from the people who came before me about institutional racism and criminal justice reform let me be very brief and say this as somebody who has one of the strongest lifetime civil rights records in the united states congress no the no president no no president will fight hard on how to end the stain of racism in this country and reform our criminal justice system per brothers and sisters today we are living in the wealthiest country in the history of the world but almost nobody knows that because almost all of the wealth rest in the hands own united states now has more income and wealth inequality than any major country on earth and it is worse today than in any time since tight teen twenty the issue of wealth and income inequality is the great moral issue of our time it is the great political issue of our time it is the great economic issue  there is something profoundly wrong when the top one tenth of one percent owns own most as much wealth as the by ninety per there is something profoundly wrong when fifty eight percent of all new income goes to the top one percent of the loaf there is something profoundly wrong when we have seen in recent years a proliferation of millionaires and billionaires while the average american works longer hours for lower wages and we have the highest rate of childhood poverty any major country that is wrong that is unacceptable that will change we need an economy that works for working families and the middle class not just i hand folks a billionaire this campaign is sending a message to the billionaire class and that misuse is simple and straightforward you cannot  you can not get huge tax breaks when children in america go hungry old cannot continue to send our jobs abroad when millions of americans are in desperate need of work right here class of this nation once the envy of the entire world that great middle class is disappearing despite exploding technology and increased worker productivity  median family income is almost five thousand dollars less today that it was in nineteen ninety nine in my state of vermont in your state of washington people are working not one job they're working two jobs they're working three jobs trying to cobble together some income and saw the health care that is not an american only when we talk about the economy and what's happening to working families it is important for you to understand that real unemployment is not the five point three percent which the newspapers report that official unemployment real unemployment includes those people who have given up looking for work and the millions of people who are working part time where they want to work full time when you add that together the real unemployment in america is almost ten and a half percent and here is something else that almost nobody discusses but it is a huge huge issue as you know one of the fun things about running for president is you can raise issues that all the people choose not to talk about and let me talk about one issue and that is that today we have a horrendous tragedy in terms of youth unemployment in america last month the old last month i asked the economic policy institute to do a study for us and what they found is that for kids who graduated high school between the age of seventeen and twenty if they were whites real unemployment and underemployment was thirty three percent if they were hispanic real unemployment was thirty six percent if they were african american real unemployment is fifty one per now there is no excuse for the united states of america having more people in jail than any other country on earth more than china all i do not want the united states to continue to have the ugly distinction of having more people in jail i want the united states to have the proud distinction of having the best educated population on earth too many lives have been destroyed by in costs aeration we need to educate we need to put people to work own when we talk about the economy it is also important to put on the table that tens of millions of people are working today at totally in adequate low wages owner did it in seattle we are now going to do it for the entire country only simple truth is not a radical idea is that no person who works forty hours a week should be living in poverty firm or the you know many republicans talk about family values you heard them talking about family values well i've got four kids i've got seven beautiful grandchildren my wife annoy i've been married for twenty seven years we believe in family our view of family values is just a little bit different the now when the republicans talk about family values let's be clear about what they're talking about they believe that women in america should not have the right to control their own bodies i disagree i believe that women in america should not have the right to buy the contraceptives they need i disagree i believe that our gay brothers and sisters should not have the right to get married and enjoy all of the benefits of big americans on i disagree old let me tell you briefly my view of family values and that is that the united states must end the international embarrassment of being the only made sure country on earth the only one which does not guarantee worker's paid medical and family  well let me tell you the olympia tell you about the real family values and that is that today in the state of washington in the state of vermont a woman is having a baby it is an extraordinary day for that woman for her family and a pretty big day for the baby as well but here's the point here is the point if that woman if that family has sufficient income that mom and the dad will be able to stay home for weeks and months getting to know and love their baby getting to bond with they have baby something for those of you what kids know is the most extraordinary moments of our lives older if that mom does not have sufficient income she will be forced to go back to work in three days five days eight days she will be separated from that baby she separating a mom from her baby because she does not have sufficient income to stay home is not a family value it is the opposite of the family and stage bus also joined the rest of the industrialized world in understanding a few points and that is that in our country today you may know this you may not know this but because of the our middle class the people of america work longer hours than do the people of any other country and yet despite the fact then eighty five percent of men are working more than forty hours sixty five percent of women are working more than forty hours there are jobs that are being offered today to provide zero non paid vacation taught and that is why i will fight for ten days paid vacation type for every worker in america when we talk about the economy when posters go out the coal you up and they say what is up almost on your mind what do you feel most strongly about invariably what the american people say is a four letter word  people understand how fragile the economy is they understand that if you're fifty five you could be replaced tomorrow by somebody half your age and half the wages they understand that if you're young how hard it is to get a job especially a job equivalent to your education people this country the old all over this country our infrastructure our roads bridges rail airports waste water plants water plants levees and dams are crumbling we used to have the best infrastructure in the world now we all fall below many other countries led us to invest and i've had what forward legislation a trillion dollars over five years rebuild our rip  structure create up to thirteen million good paying job governor america where people are building and repairing our rail system our airports our levees how dams improving our bridges improving our roads we can make america safer mor and when we talk about choice it's not only the need to create millions of decent paying jobs it is the need to stop the loss of jobs because of our disastrous trade polic you are looking at a senator and a former congressman who voted against nafta against against permanent normal trade relations with china need an approach to trade which works for working families not just the c e o s of large corporations and when we use such words as greedy recklessness illegal behavior our gets these are just some of the words to describe wall street we bailed out wall street because they say the straw and the american economy and because they were quote unquote too big to fail to day most of the major banks are big off now than they were when we bailed them out because they were too big to fail my view is pretty simple a put bank is too big to fail it's too big to exist we've got to break it  we need a financial system that is part of the economy that makes affordable loans to small and medium sized businesses that helps us create jobs helps people buy homes not charge  us outrageous interest rates on our credit cards not be an oil and unto itself whose only goal is to make outlandish profits that's break my friends let me be is once and straightforward in telling if i haven't been in telling you what i think most of you already know and that is as a result of the disastrous supreme court decision in the citizens united case the american political system has been totally corrupted corrupted and make no mistake about it the foundations of american democracy abhi being undermined what the supreme court said to the wealthiest people in this country etc guys you already owe much of the economy now we're going to let you buy the united states government and that is exactly what they are trying to do we have a situation where one family the extreme right wing koch family a family that believes in ending social security medicare medicaid the environmental protection agency the u s postal service that's their agenda that one family one family will spend almost one billion dollars on this campaign to elect candidates who represent the rich and the powerful old that is why we have got to overturn citizens united ohio not made many promises during this campaign but let me repeat one promise that i have made and that is any nominee of mine to the u s supreme court will in fact have to pass a the and that litmus test is that he or she will vote as soon as possible to overturn citizens united i am a former chairman of the senate veterans committee and i've talked to countless the over how this veterans will put their lives on the line to defend this country and to defend democracy and we cannot allow the billionaire class to destroy american democracy we've got to stand up and make it crystal clear that not only will we overturn citizens united old i believe in my heart of hearts i am a huge believe in democracy i love democracy i love the idea that everybody can participate in the political process i love the idea that we can and should have serious debates and respect people's differences of opinion i love the idea that anybody can run for office but the odd less we move to  public funding of elections young people will continue to have the big campaign funds from the rich and the powerful that i want to see and i want to see you only want to see people here tonight and all good regardless of their political views conservatives moderates progressive i want to see people say you know what i have a set of ideas this is what i believe for my other day a few days ago in d c i was at a meeting at a function under the tent with martin luther king the third all and the southern christian leadership conference a if you can believe it and how sad this is literally hours after the supreme court ruled you had states going to work trying to pass legislation making it harder for people of color law poor people and older people to vote how disgraceful now i'm a politician and i run for office sometimes i win and sometimes i lose but it has never ever occurred to me to figure out a way to keep people from voting because they disagree with me in let me see say as clearly as i can those people watch trying to keep their fellow americans from voting coming up with these phony voter fraud concerns those people are political cowards who don't have the guts to defend their idea if you're in politics tell people why you think they should vote for you don't try to prevent  today in america all of you know we are living in a highly competitive global economy and if we are going to succeed we need the best educated workforce in the world it is absolutely absurd that today in america in the year two thousand and fifteen hundreds of thousands of bright qualified young people cannot go to college simply because their families lack the and that is why i have introduced legislation that does a couple of fairly revolutionary things number one it says that in the united states of america every public college and university will be onus is such an important ideal it's not just obviously that it will make life easier financially for those who are going to college but it does something much more right now in seattle in burlington vermont this country there are kids who are in the fourth grade who are in the sixth grade their parents did go to college their friends parents didn't go to college they don't know anybody who went to college and the idea of going to college is something outside of their world view but what we will say to those kids now is if you study hall if you take school seriously you will in fact be able and when we talk about higher education financing we also have to talk about the absurdity of millions of young and not so young americans saddled with a press of student this year in vermont's met with a group of people young woman whose crime and life was she wanted to go to medical school she did she want to practice primary care with low income people that's what she's doing exactly the kind of doctors we need she left school three hundred thousand dollars i talked to a young woman in iowa she went to dental school we have a dental crisis in america we need more dentists she left dental school four hundred thousand dollars in debt and millions of others leaving college forty fifty sixty thousand dollars in debt now what sense is it that people today with student debt are paying six eight ten percent interest rates  sion that i forfeit will allow people to significantly lower their interest rates on student debt by refinancing and furthermore we're going to get the government out of profiteering o it makes no sense that you have people working today paying twenty or twenty five percent of their income paying it back on their student loans they can't get a home they can't get married that's wrong and we're going to change  and we talk about our responsibilities as human beings and as currents there is nothing more important than leaving this planet healthy and habitable for our kids and our grandchildren ok debate is over oh now it's not over on fox t v they forgot to talk about it the other day scientific community tells us that climate change is the great global crisis we face scientific community tells us climate change is real it's caused by human activity it is already causing devastating problems in our country and throughout the world and what the scientists tell us is that we have a reasonably short window of opportunity to prevent horrendous things from happening to this planet what they say and i'm on the environmental committee and the energy committee what the scientists tell us if we don't get our act together on this planet earth will become five to ten degrees warmer by the end of the century more droughts more floods more extreme weather disturbances more rising sea levels more acidification of the ocean and what the cia tells us climate change will result in more international conflict as people fight for scarce water and land resources we have a moral responsibility to lead the world to work with china and russia and india to lead the world in transforming our energy system away from fossil fuel l the truth is you know as the props of the most progressive member of the senate i have strong disagreements with my republican colleagues on a whole host of issues that goes without saying but  on this issue what we are seeing is not a disagreement we are seeing in international embarrassment when you have a major political party the knowing the reality of what science is telling us open i say to my republican colleagues i understand that your party is heavily funded by the koch brothers and their fossil fuel machine i understand you're funded by exxon mobil and the coal companies and i understand that if you listen to science they may cut your funding but i say this to my republican colleagues have the courage and the decency to listen to your kids and your grandchildren not you campaigned on and we talk about the needs of the united states of working people in the united states we should old be embarrassed that we remain the only major country on earth that does not i live in burlington vermont a hundred miles away from canada they've got a national health care system the old sure miti has a health care system the u k has a national health care when we talk about our priorities as a nation let me just tell you a little bit about where my republican colleagues are coming from i am the ranking member the leader of the opposition on the democratic side on the important budget committee several months ago the republicans controlled the house of the senate they passed their budget media didn't report about it very much but i want to tell you what was in that budget what the republicans did was throw in their budget recommended to the appropriations committees that they and the affordable care act cut medicaid by over four hundred billion dollars which meant and no one denies this twenty seven million americans would be thrown off of health insurance and when you ask them as i did tell me when you throw twenty seven million people off of health insurance how many of them will die how many of them will end up much sicker than they otherwise would have been and you know it there in syria is no answer at all they don't care and in their budget the old and in their budget over a ten year period when millions of families are struggling to figure out how they're going to send their kids to college they cut the pell grant program by ninety billion dollar and when millions of families are struggling to put food on the table when half of the kids in public schools in america get free lunch or reduced lunch because their families lack the money republicans made massive cuts in nutrition programs including the wic program which provides nutrition to low income pregnant women and then to give you an idea of their priorities to add insult to injury they proceeded to provide over two hundred and fifty billion dollars in tax breaks to the there is not a set of priorities that is moral or a set of priorities that the american people w m to do that we are going to have to build a strong grassroots movement an end reach out to people who don't necessarily agree with us on every issue my guess is that here in washington most working class republicans do not believe that we should be giving huge tax breaks for billionaires and cutting social security and medicare our job is to reach out to those republicans our job is to reach out to young people who don't understand the significance of politics for their lives our job is to b tween black and white and we have got to also on the stand that when we bring people together we cannot forget that there are eleven million people in this country who are living in the shadows we've got to bring them out of the ch we must be about bringing families together not fighting them we need comprehensive immigration reform and a path toward citizenship yesterday i had a conversation with the president about the situation in iran we chatted for a while and what i get very nervous about is that apparently many of my republican colleagues and republican candidates for president have forgotten the lessons of the wars in afghanistan and iraq j the real cost of war all not just sixty seven hundred brave americans who died in afghanistan and iraq but five hundred thousand who came home with p t s d and traumatic brain injury and if this country means anything we must make certain that every veteran gets the health care and all the benefits that they're  open in terms of iran this is what i believe i believe that a great nation must do everything that it can to resolve international conflict even with people we have strong disagreements with rather than going i voted against the war in iraq only cause i had a sense of the kind of destabilization it would bring about i want to give peace every chance every opportunity going to work with the president on his agreement in making certain that iran does not get a nuclear weapon but we can do that without going to  it let me conclude by just saying this i hope very much that the thousands of people here tonight are prepared to think big not small i hope you are prepared to imagine the kind of country we can create when government works for all of us and not just a few we can live in a country where health care is a right for all people only can live in a country where everybody us the ability and desire to get a higher education regardless of their income we can live in a country where our seniors can retire with dignity and not have to choose between food and medicine we've got  and that is why we have to expand social security not cut it only can live in a country where everybody regardless of their race their religion their disability or their sexual orientation realizes the full promise of equality that is our birthright as american insist is this is not utopian dream this is the country we can create if we are prepared to stand together if we are prepared to take on the billionaire class if we are prepared to create a vibrant powerful political movement thank you all very about