NBC News " Meet The Press" - Transcript: Black Lives Matter
Interview
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SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
Good to be with you, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD:
You were in Louisiana, so let me start with the tragic news there and get into the politics of it a little bit, which is having to do with the issue of gun control. A lot of Democrats, President Obama has expressed some remorse that he hasn't been able to make more progress on gun control. And you continue to straddle a line here. You talk about, you're sort of pro NRA votes in Vermont, having to do with being about Vermont.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
Chuck, that's not what I said. I come from the state which has virtually no gun control. And yet, I voted to ban certain types of assault weapons, I voted to close the gun show loophole. And I voted for instant background checks. And what I said is that as a nation, we can't continue screaming at each other, or else we've got to find common ground.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, what is that?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
Well, where the common ground is, for a start, universal instant background checks. Nobody should have a gun who has a criminal background, who's involved in domestic abuse situations, people should not have guns who are going to hurt other people, who are unstable. And second of all I believe that we need to make sure that certain types of guns used to kill people, exclusively, not for hunting, they should not be sold in the United States of America.
And we have a huge loophole now with gun shows that should be eliminated. There may be other things that we have to do. But coming from a rural state, I think I can communicate with folks coming from urban states, where guns mean different things than they do in Vermont, where it's used for hunting. That's where we've got to go. We don't have to argue with each other and yell at each other, but we need a common-sense solution.
CHUCK TODD:
You bring up the instant background checks. If you look at what appears to be the situation in Louisiana, the situation in Charleston, there were background checks made, and they didn't work. They didn't catch what was necessary. Instant background checks lead to more speed and more mistakes. Don't you need longer waiting periods?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
Well, what we need to do is, whatever we need, is a system that works. Bottom line is, I hope that nobody in America disagrees that people, as in the case of the shooter here in Louisiana, who has a history of mental instability, should not be having guns. People who have criminal backgrounds, people who are abusing wives or girlfriends, should not be having guns. That is the issue that I think we can bring people around.
CHUCK TODD:
I guess going back to the question, we have those laws on the books and it's not working.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
Well, we've got to make them stronger. We've got to make them more enforceable. That's what we've got to do.
CHUCK TODD:
All right, I'm going to move to, you last night spoke at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Of course, it's a major Civil Rights organization, a lot of history there. But I want to play a clip that you had sort of a reaction last week at Netroots Nation, in a confrontation with a Black Lives Matter--
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
No, I didn't have a confrontation. What I had was, I was there to speak about immigration reform. And some people thought of disrupting the meeting. And the issue that they raised was, in fact, a very important issue, about Black Lives Matter, about Sandra Bland, about black people getting yanked out of, in this case of Sandra Bland, getting yanked out of an automobile, thrown to the ground, and ended up dead three days later because of a minor traffic violation. So, you know, this is an issue which is a very important issue, an issue of concern that I strongly share.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, I guess there were some people who felt that you were being too dismissive of the protesters.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
Well, I'm not dismissive. I've been involved in the Civil Rights movement all of my life. And I believe that we have to deal with this issue of institutional racism. This is what I also believe. And speaking to the FCLC last night, this is what I quoted. Martin Luther King, when he died, when he was assassinated, understood and was working on a poor people's march. We have to end institutional racism, but we have to deal with the reality that 50% of young black kids are unemployed. That we have massive poverty in the America, in our country, and we an unsustainable level of income and wealth inequality.
CHUCK TODD:
The criticism that's come to you at this though is that your answer is always economic injustice, and that many African American activists believe, "No, no, no, no, no, you've got to deal with race. Institutional racism is a separate problem from economic injustice."
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
They're parallel problems. They are. Absolutely correct. But as Martin Luther King Junior told us, we have to address both. We have to rid this country of racism. What we saw in Charleston, South Carolina, a few weeks ago, a guy motivated by hate groups, who goes out and kills black people because they're black. Sandra Bland being yanked out of a car, dying three days later, for what? For a minor traffic violation.
But my view is that we have got to deal with the fact that the middle class in this country is disappearing, that we have millions of people working for wages that are much too low, impacts everybody, impacts the African American community even more. Those are issues that do have to be dealt with and just at the same time as we deal with institutional racism.
CHUCK TODD:
Let me go to economic injustice. Hillary Clinton on Friday gave a speech in front of a Wall Street crowd, showing that we wants to get a little tougher on Wall Street. Does that tell you your campaign is working?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
I think my campaign is working. I think a whole lot of people are talking about what I've been talking about for decades. And that it is morally unacceptable that the top 1/10 of 1% of people in this country own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90%.
That we have millions of people working for starvation wages, that we've got to raise the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour, that we have a trade policy which allows corporations to shut down in America and take out jobs for cheap labor countries abroad. So I think that message is resonating. I am in red states, I am in blue states, and I think the American people want changes in the way we do economics and politics.
CHUCK TODD:
This morning, New York Times and Washington Post lumped you and Donald Trump as touching the same chord but in very different ways. You buy that comparison?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
No, I don't. I think the chord that we are touching all over this country is that people are profoundly disgusted with the economics that make the richest people richer and everybody else poorer. They are profoundly angered and disturbed by a political campaign system that, not yeah, that allows billionaires to buy elections because of this disastrous campaign finance system called Citizens United.
And what I have said is that if elected president, we're going to pass a constitutional amendment to get rid of Citizens United so that we'll restore democracy in America, and not move for oligarchy. This is a huge, huge issue.
CHUCK TODD:
So you don't buy these comparisons to Trump and the chord and the populist core he's touching either?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
No, I've been working with people who are saying that it is absurd that almost all new income and all new wealth is going to the top 1%. They can't afford to send their kids to college, they can't afford childcare for their kids. They're working longer hours for lower wages. We want an economy that works for all of us, and not just the billionaire class. We want a campaign finance system that ordinary people can run for office on without being dependent on the Koch brothers and other billionaires.
CHUCK TODD:
All right, Senator Bernie Sanders, I'm going to leave it there. I know you've been all over the country these days campaigning, stay safe on the trail, sir. Thanks for coming on.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS:
My pleasure.
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