Bonus: Democracy Town Hall With Bernie Sanders

Welcome to Another Way, the podcast of Equal Citizens. I'm Jason Harrow, the chief counsel and Executive Director of Equal Citizens. I'm here to give a quick introduction today to something we're really, really excited about. And that is a historic one hour in depth conversation about democracy reform issues with none other than Senator Bernie Sanders, Vermont Senator and leading Democratic presidential candidate. This was a historic event that we held in Concord, New Hampshire on December 28th. We had the Senator in conversation with Equal Citizens founder Larry Lessig and prominent anti corruption advocate Zephyr Teachout. And for over an hour, he took questions about all the topics we think about every day at Equal Citizens and that we podcast about each week. He took questions about the Electoral College, he took questions about public financing and corruption, ranked choice, voting, gerrymandering, voting rights, everything on the menu. And as I think you'll see, the Senator had some really wonderful answers. So this conversation again took place live at Concord, New Hampshire, December 28. Tell your friends and neighbors if you care about these issues, tell them to listen to this conversation. Super interesting stuff. And it shows that candidates and audiences care deeply about these issues. They care about making our democracy stronger and making it less corrupt. One quick word before the conversation starts. You can find this podcast at equalcitizens us anotherway or patreon.com equalcitizens if you want to support it, it's always free. It's always ad free. But if you want to throw us a couple bucks a month on Patreon, that would be fantastic. Okay, without any further ado, I bring you Larry Lessig and Zephyr Teachout in conversation with Senator Bernie Sanders.

Welcome everyone, and thank you so much for being here. My name is Olivia Zink. I'm the Executive Director at Open Democracy Action, one of the co hosts of today's forum. This evening's event focuses on democracy reform. We'll cover redistricting, campaign finance, voting rights, and many other democracy reform. I want to remind everyone that this is a nonpartisan event. We've done this with 10 presidential candidates. And I want to welcome to the stage Larry Lessig, Zephyr teachout, and Senator Bernie Sanders.

Thank you.

So my name is Larry Lessig. I'm extraordinarily excited to see so many people here for our 10th Democracy Forum. Our objective tonight is to get as many questions about Democracy Forum out as we can. And I'm so honored to have my friend in this fight for so many years, Zephyr teachout up here. And so grateful for the work of open democracy. Olivia Zink so grateful for the of common cause to bring out so many of you and so excited that there are 40 volunteers here tonight who've made this thing an extraordinary success. Please help me. So I want to say one thing before I hand it over to Bernie, who's going to give us an introduction and then we'll start with the questions. In May of 2012, I first met Bernie Sanders. 2012. His staff had written me and said, can you come down and give some testimony about something called the Open Source Dividend project? So the idea was instead of giving pharmaceutical companies patents, give them a prize if they come up with some great idea. And then once that prize is given to them, then the idea is available for everybody. Now this idea is a great idea. It's not even a radical idea. There are many non radical people who've loved this idea. It would be an extraordinary idea to include in the way that we try to incentivize innovation. It's also an idea that will never happen in Washington. There is zero chance that the intellectual property monopoly will allow Washington to pass such a great idea. So when I was asked to come, I thought, oh my God, why? But then I thought, okay, of course, if I'm asked to come, I will come. And I testify. And I come to the Senate committee room and I walk in, I think there's nobody there. And I think there's just one senator sitting up there running this committee hearing on this bill and that's Senator Bernie Sanders. Now, everyone in this audience loves this country. And when you love this country, there are moments where you have this kind of chills at the back of your neck or kind of weepy feeling. And it might be 4th of July or the national anthem at a basketball game or driving by a cemetery, veterans in that cemetery, whatever that moment is. I am a geeky sort. This hearing was that moment for me because when I saw this senator running a hearing, not because he was trying to raise money from anybody, there's no open source money, I can tell you, none. Not because he thought he was going to win, he knew he wasn't going to win, but because he knew it was right. He knew it was right. And he knew that if he laid the foundation for this right idea, someday, maybe someday we could come around to consider and understand why it was so important. So I don't know who you're going to support in this election. I don't want to know. This is not that kind of event. But I want to start by asking you to stand with me to honor this extraordinary leader, not because necessarily of any particular thing in this campaign, but because of everything he's done to stand for ideas and right regardless of what's politically possible at the moment. He is an inspiration and I'm so grateful he is here tonight. Please join me in thanking. Thank you.

Thank you, Larry, very much for all the work you have done over the years on American democracy and corruption in our political process. And Zephyr, thank you so much for all the work you have done as well. Let me thank. It's quite a crowd. Thank you all very much for coming out for what is for me, I guess you've done 10 of these. But this is an unusual meeting because what we are doing this evening touches every other aspect of politics. You're concerned about health care, you're concerned about the issues we're talking about. You're concerned about climate change, you're concerned about education, you are concerned about criminal justice. Whatever the issues are that you are concerned about, you must be concerned about the state of our democracy. You must be concerned about the corruption of our campaign finance situation. Now, I am an old fashioned conservative, I guess, because I believe in American democracy. I know it's a radical idea. I got it. It's a very radical idea. And let me go even further. I believe in one person, one vote. And now I'm going to shock all of you. I don't believe billionaires should be able to buy elections, Et cetera. And what I just want to say, and we'll discuss it this evening, proceeds, is that democracy is in trouble, not just here in the United States. We are seeing in truth democracy retreating all over the world. And this is a very, very serious issue. And as President of the United States, I will do my best not only to reinvigorate democracy in this country, but to stand up for democracy and human rights in every country on earth. Now, I expect that Zephyr and Larry know more about the issue than I do. But I think it is fair to say that democracy from a world historical point of view is a pretty new idea and it's a pretty radical idea. Think about it. Throughout world history, you have had kings who have had sole power over their people to make war, to raise taxes. You've had czars to keep people in slavery or neo slavery. And the rights of people to determine their own future is a pretty new idea. Pretty radical idea that says that everybody, and God only knows that in this country we have had a torturous path toward expanding democracy. I don't know if they Teach this in the textbooks. But kids, if any of the kids are here. Not everybody had the right to vote when this country was first founded. You got to be a wealthy white guy to vote. All right. Women did not have the right to vote. African Americans did not have the right to vote. Native Americans did not have the right to vote. Young people did not have the right to vote. And what we have seen throughout the course of our history is an incredible struggle, an incredible struggle for more democracy, for the rights of African American people to be able to walk into a polling booth and cast a ballot. Hundred years ago, women in America did not have the right to vote. Not so many years ago, young people in this country who were drafted to go off and fight in Vietnam asked the question, how come you're asking me to get killed in Vietnam, but I don't have a right to vote, whether or not we should be in that war. And we lowered the voting age from 21 down to 18, et cetera, et cetera. Now, I think we'll get to so much to be talked about tonight, but certainly one of the issues that we want to talk about is the power of big money over the political process. And Larry gave one example, dealing with the pharmaceutical industry. So let me just pick up on that one example. In America today, you pay. I pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. Number of months ago, I went to Canada with people who are suffering from diabetes. We bought insulin for 110 of the price, same product as charged here in the United States of America. Because the drug companies here can double, triple the price of the medicine you get tomorrow. There is no restriction to what they can charge you. Do you think it might have something to do with the fact that, that over the last 20 years the drug companies have spent $4 billion on lobbying and campaign contributions? 4. Over $4 billion in a 20 year period. Go check, go to the Internet, go check the campaign finance people. You will find almost everybody, Democrat, Republican, on the receiving end of campaign contributions from pharma. Go to small states, whether it's Vermont, New Hampshire, you'll find lobbyists flooding into the state at any time. There's a discussion about controlling pharmaceutical prices. Talk about climate change. How does it happen that you have fossil fuel companies with impunity destroying our planet? They got something to do with the huge amounts of money they spent on campaign contributions and lobbying and of course it does. How does it happen that we have Republican leadership in Congress right now and if Mitch McConnell were here, he would tell you this? And I give him credit for that. He would tell you that what we have got to do is give more tax breaks to billionaires and then cut Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and education. That's what the Republican leadership believes. Where do those ideas come from? Do you think the majority of the American people support those ideas? Not in a million years. They believe exactly the opposite. But that is what the wealthy and the powerful and campaign contributors want to see. So if we are serious about providing health care to all people as a human right, which I believe is the way we have got to go, if we are serious about substantially lowering prescription drug costs in this country, if we are serious about demanding that at a time of massive income and wealth inequality, the rich and large, profitable corporations start paying their fair share of taxes, if we are concerned about all of those issues and more, we have got to talk about campaign finance reform. We have got to talk about reinvigorating American democracy. And that means my dream is that in America, not only do we make it easier for people to vote as opposed to making it harder, I want this country to have the highest voter turnout of any major country on earth, not one of the lowest voter turnouts. That's my dream. Thank you all very much.

Thank you, Senator. So actually, just picking up on what you were just talking about, there has been a spate of laws introduced in various states to make it harder for people to vote. Can you describe two things? One, where do you think that's coming from? Who's driving that? Like, who's behind it? And second, what do we do about it?

You know, in a certain sense, these issues, as an elected official, somebody who has run for office many, many times in Vermont, become personal to me in the same way that if we were discussing a medical issue and dealing with unscrupulous doctors, and you were a doctor, you would say, you know, that's personal to me. If you were an automobile mechanic, dealing with a cheating mechanic, it would be personal to you. This is personal to me.

Personal.

It's personal in the sense that I happen to believe in democracy. And what that means for me is when I campaign in Vermont, I have to tell people what I believe, argue with my opponents, why I believe I'm a better candidate than they are and go out and ask people to support me. That's called democracy. And I love that. I believe in that. You know, I have won elections in my life, I have lost elections in my life. But I so much appreciate the idea of people thinking. And I know many of you are here today. I don't know who you're going to vote for. You're probably listening to me, listen to other candidates. You're trying to, you know, get a sense of what candidate you like the best. That's called democracy. That is a beautiful thing. That's a beautiful thing. And yet we have in this country people who are political cowards who think the only way they can win elections is not based on their idea. It's not going out to people say, vote for me. This is what I believe. Or this is why my opponent is wrong. The only way they think they can win elections is to suppress the vote. And they have not been shy in state after state on the Republican leadership in trying to do just that. Making it harder for people of color to vote, making it harder for poor people in this state, New Hampshire, making it harder for young people to vote, making it harder for Native Americans to vote. And they are doing it because they understand that the agenda that they stand for is not an agenda that the majority of the people support. If you support giving tax breaks to billionaires and cutting education and health care and Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, you know what? That is not something that people are going to vote for. So you win elections by making it harder for those people to vote. And it's not only harder. I remember there are elections in this country where you got to wait hours on hours to vote. You got to wait five hours at a polling place. In Arizona, people waited seven hours to cast the vote. And it's not an accident. There are a few polling places in African American communities and in poor people's communities. So this is not an accident. Recently, as you know, in the last couple of weeks, we have seen in Wisconsin and in Georgia, I believe, hundreds of thousands of people thrown off the voter lists. And ostensibly it's because, well, they're trying to save money or something, some other gibberish out there. But everybody knows what's going on. They're making it harder for people who will vote against Republicans to participate. And I really think that this is obscene. And I believe from the bottom of my heart, as somebody who has won elections and I've lost elections, I could deal with losing an election, but I will never sit around trying to think, oh, I gotta keep you from voting, because you might vote against me. If I can't win an election on my ideas, then I should get the hell out of polit. So that's what it's about. It is about big money, interest buying politicians who have an agenda that represents the wealthy and cannot win in a free and fair election. What do we do about it? Well, I think what we do about it is simplify our election voting laws. And that is in one way or another to make it clear that in the United States of America, if you are 18 years of age and you are a citizen of this country, you have the right to vote. End of discussion.

So one issue that you've raised and a number of candidates have raised is this bizarre institution called the Electoral College, which every once in a while seems more frequently produces the anomalous result of the loser becoming the winner, but in every single election produces the result that the candidates running for president are focused on just a small number of states, the so called swing states. So in 2016, 99% of campaign spending was in just 14 states, which means that candidates are worried about what those 14 states want. And those 14 states turn out to be. People in those states turn out to be older, they turn out to be whiter. Their industry is kind of 19th century industry. This state excepted, of course, here, you know, there are seven and a half times the number of people in America in solar energy as mined coal mining. But you don't hear about solar energy because those people live in Texas and California. You hear about coal mining because those people are swing states. So you've talked about abolishing the Electoral College. Those of us who want to believe that change is possible here, how do we do it given 38 states are going to be.

Larry, look, I mean, you raise. I mean, I think it's very hard to argue against what you said. Donald Trump lost the popular election by over 3 million votes. Is that correct? Donald Trump is President of the United States. That does not add up. That's wrong. You know what I believe, and I think most people believe in is democracy, is person who gets the most votes wins them. It's not a radical idea. Trump did not get the most votes. In fact, he lost by a lot of votes, yet he is President of the United States. And Larry raised the second issue that we don't talk enough about, and that is so many states in this country are ignored during the campaign because either they're Democratic states or they're Republican states. All right, not too many campaigns, candidates are going to be going to Vermont because Vermont is not going to vote for Donald Trump. That I can assure you. And I'm increasing convinced, by the way, that New Hampshire is not going to vote for Trump either. On the other hand, it is very unlikely that Wyoming or South Dakota is going to be voting for a Democratic candidate. So what that means, as you indicated, during campaigns, people go to those states where they have a chance to win. And whatever the number is, 12, 13, 15, whatever it may be, the so called battleground states. And the point that Larry just made is then that distorts the campaign in the sense that the issues of many, many states that are either Democratic or Republican are not going to get a full hearing. All right, California is the largest state in this country. It is not going to vote for Trump. My guess is there'll be very little campaigning during the general election. Okay, Largest state in America. And their needs, which are many, are not going to be heard by the candidates. So I think that clearly what we have got to do is end a system which allows a candidate who gets a minority of votes to become president and a system which ignores the needs of over 30 states in this country. And we can talk about how we go from there, because as you've indicated, it is in the interest of some to maintain the system. And there are a lot of ideas that are out there right now which will move us in that direction. But count me on board as saying that it is increasingly difficult to defend a system which allows a minority, a guy who got a minority vote to become president.

So I want to ask you about gerrymandering. So technically, in a gerrymandered district, everybody still gets the right to vote. But the Supreme Court has recently decided that there's no constitutional problem with the most blatant, extreme, partisan gerrymandering. So it's up to Congress and the states to act. Can you just briefly explain why gerrymandering is a problem and what you would do about it?

Gerrymandering, which I think everybody is familiar with, is not a new issue. In fact, it was named after Mr. Gerry, right. Who lived when? Way back when. When?

1820s.

1820s. Okay, so he invented the army idea, not a new idea. But as is often the case, there's an idea that was bad that has been magnified many, many times over. And I think it's fair to say that over the history of the country, both Democrats and Republicans have manipulated districts to work to their advantages. But right now, you have Republicans taking it to an extreme degree. What does it mean? It means that you manipulate districts in order to maximize the kind of results that you want for your legislature, perhaps, or for members in the United States Congress. So you carve up, you may in some states create a district which is overwhelmingly African American, which is going to vote Democratic. And the Democratic candidate will get 80, 90% of the vote rather than have a more natural district where maybe the African American vote is 50 or 60%. And in that case people, the African American community would have more representation in their state legislature or more representation in the United States Congress. So it is distressing that the Supreme Court made the ruling they did because they. But the Supreme Court itself is increasingly becoming a partisan operation, which is unfortunate unto itself. So I think what you're beginning to see, and I suppose the solution will rest in honest people saying, look, here is a district. You don't have a long, long skinny district that excludes this group of people, that excludes this group of people. But you have districts, if necessary, develop by bipartisan independent groups who will sit down and create fair districts so that in fact people will have one person, will be in a one person, one vote thing kind of district. So I would suppose that the solution rests with taking the partisanship out of it, if we can, and giving them to independent bodies who can create districts that are fair.

So there's a lot of people in this room who've been organizing to get ranked choice voting in New Hampshire and in other parts of the country, including Massachusetts, after Maine took the lead in passing ranked choice voting and having an election recently. About that, I wonder if you look forward to this general election and imagine the nightmare scenario, we might call it, of independent candidates running in that general election. Whether you think there would be an urgent need for states in the general election to consider having ranked choice voting or instant runoff voting so that we don't get a candidate selected who actually isn't supported by the majority of Americans.

Well, I worry about this issue in general. What ends up happening in many elections is we vote for the lesser of two evils. So if you have three candidates, hypothetically, and I have been in, you know, three person race, so this has impacted me, but it's impacted people all over the country. And you like this person the most, but polling tells you that that person is only going to get 10 or 15% and you really hate that person. So you're going to vote for the third person you don't particularly like, right? Well, I think that kind of disenfranchises you a bit. And I think you should have the right to vote for the candidate you believe in. Even if the polling suggests that he or she is at 10 or 15%, you can should be able to make that vote. And that's what ranked voting is about. So I think if we are believing in democracy and the right for people to have the freedom to cast their ballot, not if they choose the lesser of two evils. That is something that I support.

So, Senator, we started talking about the pharmaceutical industry and the $4 billion, and under the current campaign finance system, how the majority of Congress members and senators are taking money from big pharma. So we want to imagine what the alternative looks like. You have supported democracy vouchers, and I would love to hear you explain why you support that. And you've supported publicly financed elections with matching funds. So can you describe why you support those and what this alternative vision looks like?

So let's look at the current situation. Then we'll look, as Zephyr suggests, at the alternative current situation. All of you who are billionaires, and I'm sure there are many of you in the room, but we have a case history right now in front of us. And I don't mean to beat up on Mr. Bloomberg in particular, but. No, and I don't. I don't. But it is the arrogance of somebody who say, you know, I'm worth $55 billion and what does it matter to me? I'm going to spend a billion dollars. That's nothing. It's nothing for me. I'll probably have more. I'll have made more than I spent at the end of the campaign. And I think it'd be cool to run for President of the United States. And what is a billion dollars? So right now, I think he's been in the race for three or four weeks. He has spent hundreds of millions of dollars already on campaign ads. In fact, the two billionaires in the race, I believe, have spent more than all of the other candidates combined. We're spending money here in New Hampshire on TV, but ain't like what Mr. Bloomberg is doing, that's for sure. All right, so you got that issue right now that in America, some of you who have studied issues, who hear passionately about issues, who think that you would be a good elected official, it has never in a million years occurred to you that you could run for office because you know that to run for President of the United States or the governor or whatever it may be, it costs a lot of money, and you don't have a lot of money. So unlike Mr. Bloomberg or other billionaires, it never occurs to you that you should run for office, despite the fact you might be an excellent candidate and an excellent elected official. But it's not only running for office. You got billionaires. Koch brothers were the best example of it, but not the only example. Who would be spending as billionaires hundreds of millions of dollars. Imagine one family or a handful of people spending hundreds of millions of dollars. What these guys do is they sit in the room and say, okay, we're going to put money into this West Virginia race. We're going to put money into this Massachusetts race, put money into this district in California. They sit around the table. They don't know who the candidates are, but they are determined to represent candidates who will elect candidates who represent the wealthy and the powerful. That is, again, an obscene violation of, in my view, democratic principles. All right, so what you got is a system in which many, not all, but many elected officials are dependent upon their campaign contributors. Now, what candidates will tell you is, oh, yes, I go to wealthy people's homes and I raise huge sums of money. Doesn't impact me. Oh, I have a super pac and billionaires are putting in money that is unaccountable. Doesn't impact me. Sure it doesn't. Why do you think billionaires and the wealthy make campaign contributors? They may be greedy, but they are not stupid. And they understand that when they invest, it is an investment. You're a business. You put money. You know, you do TV ads. You hire good people. You do all the things you do. You are hiring your elected officials. So anybody who tells you that they're busy while they're busy raising money from the wealthy and the powerful and CEOs of large corporations, it doesn't impact you. They are not telling you the truth. Of course it impacts you. Everybody knows that. All right, so how do we deal with that? How do we deal with it? Well, above and beyond making all the political changes that we have to make, making sure that everybody 18 years of age can vote without impediment, making sure that we have end this obscene and extreme gerrymandering that goes on. We need real campaign finance reform. And as Zephyr mentioned earlier, the obvious first step is to overturn this disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision. But that's not enough. You don't want to go back to where we were. Just simply go back to where we were pre Citizens United. That's not good enough. So what we want to do, and there are different approaches to this with which good people disagree, and I'll tell you where I'm coming down on it. But what you want to do is move toward public funding of elections. And when you take that step forward, there are various ways that you can go forward. And some states have already had pretty good success. I think Maine is working pretty well, isn't it? New York City is working fairly well. Who's here from Maine? Okay, you know something about the thing there. There you go. And my understanding, not that I am asking you to speak for all of Maine, but is that Republicans and Democrats are taking advantage of the clean money. Is that right?

But the kitchen out of the Supreme

Court, they have been taking less and less, okay? But the idea of public funding in general, the broad idea, is that anybody in this room who wants to run for office and can indicate a degree of support should be able to run for office. And instead of having to go to wealthy campaign contributors, you'll get funded out of the general public tax fund. Now people say, oh, the government is funding politicians, wasting all of that money. Well, I will tell you, it is much, much preferable to have candidates receiving support from the general fund than it is from billionaires and CEOs of large corporations. All right, so there are a number of ways you could do public funding. And I think New York City does it in a way, Maine does it in a way, and other states have experimented with different ways. And I think I'm coming down on the side of what we call, I guess, democracy vouchers. Is that the correct. And I'll tell you why I like this. And what it says is that if you want to make, we will provide with you out of tax dollars, a sum of money, and people will argue what that sum of money is. A good friend of mine, Ro Connor of California, I think, proposed $50 or something Roe proposed, and it may want to go higher than that. But whatever it may be, is to say, all right, you're going to get a voucher, and maybe it's 100 bucks, and you will contribute that to any candidate that you want. Now, what I like about that, obviously, is that it allows candidates to raise money from the general public rather than wealthy individuals. What I also like about it, the extra bonus of that is it suddenly makes people begin to think about politics in a way that they have not thought about it before. And let me just give an advertisement for myself here right now because I'm very proud of this. Is that what I like about my campaign and why I have decided to vote for me, after a lot of thought and debate about it, is this our campaign? And I am very proud of this, has received more campaign contributions from more Americans than any candidate in the history of American politics. I believe. I'm not 100% sure, but I believe that within the next few days, we will have received 5 million contributions from, well, Over a million people, probably closing in. 1.3, 1.4 million people. And you know what the average contribution is? 18 bucks. So that's what we are doing under the present system. But the idea of saying to people, you know what, you're going to get a $200 check and you can make that contribution any candidate you want, Presidential candidate, US Senate candidate, House candidate, Governor, whatever it may be, you know what that does to you? It says, you know what? Hey, I got a bit of power here. I got a better start studying whether I like candidate X or candidate Y, who's going to represent my interest best, because I'm going to make a 50 buck dollar contribution to that candidate. So I think that's an exciting idea. I think it's one approach toward revitalizing American democracy and breaking our dependence on billionaires and the wealthy are dominating the political process.

So, you know, you've got two law professors up here.

I'm in trouble. Two law professors.

I think we give you full marks on every single answer you've given. It's been extraordinary. I'm going to ask one more question, then we're going to take a bunch of questions. Questions. We've got 5,000 questions from the audience, so we're going to go through those. But here's a question. If Nancy Pelosi were here and she listened to the issues we just went through, she would say, wait a minute, this is reminding me of something. There was a bill passed by the House of representatives this year, HR1, the most ambitious reform package passed by the House since the Voting Rights act of 1965. It sits in the well of the United States Senate now because. Because of course, the Majority Leader will not bring it up. But what was significant about HR1, it included every one of the reforms we were talking about except the Electoral College. And it is fundamental reform. I think it gets us 80% to where we want to go. I support vouchers, and vouchers should be in there too. So I think we could improve it. But just as important as the fundamental reform is the fact that it was HR1. It was a recognition of what you said at the very beginning. We don't get anything until we get this done first. So the question for you, Senator, is will you ask that there be an HR one, or let's call it POTUS one? Will you introduce POTUS one, which is a package of reforms that are fundamental to make it possible for you to get everything else that you want to get done done?

Absolutely, absolutely. You know, because as you Said, quoting me. So we go around the circles. I mean, this is what we understand, all right? Are we interested in climate change? Are we interested in health care? Are we interested in education? Are we interested in having a fair tax system so the wealthy start paying their fair share of taxes? Are we interested in having the best public educational system in the world, from childcare through graduate school, et cetera, et cetera? If we are interested in any of those issues and a dozen more, then we have got to make sure that we have elected officials who represent what the people want, not what wealthy campaign contributors want. So my agenda is a progressive agenda. I believe that my agenda speaks to the needs of working families. I do not believe that my agenda speaks to the needs of the billionaires and wealthy campaign contributors who will be at war against everything we are trying to accomplish. So it goes without saying that I will prioritize the need to revitalize American democracy and to create a campaign finance system that is based on justice, not billionaires buying elections.

You go first. But it goes without saying. But I am so happy you said it, Senator, because it is such a critical point for us to understand. So we're going to do a bunch of the questions we got from the audience.

Do you believe, and I'm just reading directly the questions from the audience. Do you believe there is a growing movement for democracy reform?

There is a growing movement for democracy reform as exemplified by the work that you guys are doing and by the turnout here tonight. But what I will also say is there is a growing movement against democracy in this country and around the world.

Okay, so I have to give a background before this question gets asked. On this table, there's a book titled Granny D, American Century. I'm sure, Bernie, you met Granny D. Granny D was a woman that many of you knew. At the age of 88, she started a walk from California to Washington, D.C. she arrived at the age of 90. Across the country, she had on her chest a sign that said campaign finance reform. And we've Open Democracy and New Hampshire Rebellion have replicated those walks here in New Hampshire. We've actually walked from the top of New Hampshire to the bottom in the middle of January twice to celebrate what Granny D was trying to do. So here's the question. Would you fix it first? Would you join a Walk for an Open Democracy event to raise awareness for the need for campaign finance reform? You don't have to walk the whole state in the month of January, but.

Well, as President of the United States, I probably have a better chance to do Than there's walking, but I would be happy to walk as well. Well, but. And Granny D is an inspiration to all of us because she understood and, you know, needless to say, go all over the country. And we hold. This is the third town meeting we've had today. So we do a lot of meetings, and people are concerned about this issue and that issue. But too often, the issue of why we are where we are and the corruption of American democracy does not get the attention that it deserves. The understanding that we can't bring about or that it will be very difficult for us to bring about the changes that we want unless we create a more democratic society is not something that is on everybody's lips. So people will talk about climate change, they'll talk about health care, they'll talk about sexism, they'll talk about racism, but they won't talk about why we are where we are. They won't talk about, how does it happen that we have more income and wealth inequality today than any time since the 1920s? How did that happen? How does it happen that large corporations like Amazon don't pay a nickel in federal income taxes? How does it happen that we haven't raised the federal minimum wage in God knows when and it remains at seven and a quarter now, how do those things happen? Is it related to what Brandy D. Was talking about? Absolutely, it is. So I will join you on the walk. But maybe even more important, as president of the United States, will bring about these reforms. Bravo.

This person asks, what will you do to reach 80% turnout?

Well, first of all, we will hold it out as a goal. You don't hear Trump talking about voter turnout, do you? You don't hear Republicans saying, gee, I'm a little bit embarrassed that here in our great democracy, we have one of the lowest voter turnouts of any major country on earth. Is that right? Europe, depending on the election, they got what, 70, 75%? 80? What have we got? Less than 60. Okay. So I think because I'm a competitive guy, I want our country to do the best in the whole world. All right? I want us to have the highest voter turnout in the world. So, first of all, you establish that as a goal. And then the next question, how do you get there? Well, one way you get there is you sure as hell end voter suppression in this country. And, you know, there are ways, and I'm not an expert on this, and I would look to these guys for advice and many other people that, you know, you can almost move, I think, to automatically voter registration you're 18 years of age, you're registered to vote. What's so hard about that? And we do things. Some years ago I introduced legislation which I think was a good idea, and I'd like to see it implemented because we believe in democracy. We should celebrate democracy and have Election Day as a national holiday. And when you think about impediments to people voting, there are many states where you don't have early voting and you have polling places closing literally at sometimes what, 6, 7 o'. Clock. So you go to work.

I'm a worker.

I got to travel an hour to work. That's not so unusual. And I'm working to 5, 5, 30. And I what do I got to do? Cut out of work to go vote. Maybe I miss voting. So in a variety of ways, by extending voting hours, by having a national holiday, so you have all day and it's. Imagine that people will be thinking and talking, who are you going to vote for? Why are you voting for that person? And we go out and we have all data to take the day off and to vote for the candidate we choose. Certainly we are seeing experiments in Oregon and Washington state with early, with using mail. I mean, bottom line is we can figure out how we make it easier for people to vote, and we're making some progress in that. But the bottom line is, let us encourage people to vote. Let us use our schools to make sure that kids understand the importance of democracy and why they should be participating in the political process. Let's do all of those things. And if we do it, you know what, reaching 80% is absolutely doable.

So there are many candidates who've been talking about democracy reform on the campaign trail and a couple during the debates who've been willing to raise it and push it forward. Andrew Yang was the first of our candidates on this stage who spoke out and said he would support democracy vouchers as well. This question is, will you continue to talk about public financing on the debate stage so that the public, beyond this public, begins to understand it?

Well, I talk about public financing in almost every event that we do. And very often, people, why don't you talk about this issue and that issue on the debate? Well, you got, you know, 45 seconds to give your spiel, but it is an issue I will keep in the back of my mind and try to talk about it because again, it impacts every other issue that we face.

So I think this question goes to a Supreme court decision from 1976, Buckley vs. Valeo. The question is, will you campaign for A constitutional amendment to overturn the idea that money is speech.

Absolutely. Absolutely. All right. You know, and Buckley Vallejo started. That was the predecessor. I'm talking to two law professors here, so I have to be careful. But that was the decision that laid the groundwork for Citizens United. Right. And that's it. You know, the argument of Mitch McConnell, who was one of the major proponents of Citizens United, and the other said, look, it's my money and I want to go out and buy a house. Don't tell me I can't. I want to go out and buy a can of peas. Don't tell me I can't do that. I want to go out and buy an election. Don't tell me I can't do that. Well, we're here to say you can't do that. All right. That democracy is not for sale, cannot be for sale. And what Buckley Vallejo said, it's my money and I'm a billionaire. Right. Correct me if I'm wrong. And I want to run for election. Citizens United broadened that and said that it's my money. I will spend as much as I want supporting other candidates. I think both of those ideas are bad. And I think, certainly we need a constitutional amendment to make certain that billionaires do not buy elections.

So 2016, you witnessed the devastating effects of millions of voters being shut out of primary elections, in large part due to closed primaries in other states. Do you believe in prime, that primaries should be open to independent voters, as it is in New Hampshire?

Yes. Okay. I mean, I think. And we're dealing with this issue, you know, every state has their own business. And Zephyr, for example, knows New York State law. Right. Where? Unbelievable. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but, you know, we went through this. If you are. Look, there are a lot of people, for a lot of reasons, who decide not to register as a Democrat or Republican. Right. They register as an independent or no political preference, whatever it may be. And in New York State, if you wanted to participate in the Democratic primary, you had to change your registration. Was it seven months before the primary or something like that? Many months before. And the goal was quite intentional, not an accident, to keep people from participating in the primary. In California, you had another thing. They have jungle primaries. They also have impediments making it difficult for people who are non Democrats, not Republicans, to participate in primaries. But I believe that, yes. I mean, I think what New Hampshire does is the right thing, and I think that's what we should be doing around the country.

Well, I'VE got a lot of great questions here, and there are several on gerrymandering, which you already addressed. This one is about the military budget. We just passed a $738 billion military budget. Do lobbyists for the military industrial complex and their donations distort the democratic process?

That's an issue we don't talk about very much because, sad to say, hasn't always been the case, but it has been in recent years. It's kind of a bipartisan issue. I am proud to tell you that I am the only presidential candidate who is a senator who has voted against all of Trump's military budgets. And what you got here is you say 738. It's actually, I think, more than that because there are other agencies and funding sources that are really military that are not necessarily part of the Pentagon budget. What you have is, again, when you talk about a corrupt political process, you're talking about former generals and admirals who suddenly appear on the board of directors of the major military contractors in this country. It's a revolving door big time in the military. And here's the other thing that you don't hear much about. We did some work on this is the Pentagon is the only budget that has not successfully gone through an independent audit. So it is by far the largest budget, and yet it has not been independently audited because it is so very complicated. There is enormous waste in the military budget. Enormous waste. There are cost overruns, there is price fixing, there is corruption. But that is an issue we don't talk about a whole lot because if you vote against the defense budget, then people are worried about a 30 second ad which will say, you're not prepared to defend America, you're weak on defense, and, you know, people are afraid of that. But we are now spending as a nation more than the next 10 countries combined. You got Russia and China and France and Ukraine. Next 10 countries combined, we are spending more than they are in totality. So I think we also have to take a look not only at the military budget, but the arms sales of the United States. You have Trump being very upfront about it, you know, representing defense contractors and selling arms to Saudi Arabia, which is a horrific dictatorship. So taking a hard look at the military budget is something that we will certainly do in our administration.

So we have time for one last question. This is a question from Diane Russell, who was a little bit humble in the way she introduced herself, because Diane, because of public funding, could go from waitressing to becoming the chairman of the Welfare Committee. Well, you went from two,

right?

Yeah. Thank you.

So she. So her question is this. You have said you disagree with expanding the Supreme Court. Can you explain your plan to rebalance the court? I mean, if we expanded it, maybe Zephyr could be your first appointee to that court.

Not a bad idea. Here is the problem. And the idea of expanding the Supreme Court, not a new idea. FDR tried it in what year? In the mid-30s?

1938.

38. So you got right now and it is said, and these guys, again, at some point, I'd love to hear what they have to say. I'm doing all the talking, they know more than I do. But you know, the history of the Supreme Court is very interesting, Rose. Roosevelt tried to expand the Supreme Court in 1938 because he kept trying to do what the American people wanted him to do, trying to get the country out of a depression. So many people unemployed, underemployed, massive poverty. And he tried to do the right thing. And the business community, the big money interest went to the Supreme Court. And many of the things that he was trying to do were ruled unconstitutional. So you try to what we call pack the court, just add more people who would be sympathetic to his point of view. Theoretically, what the Supreme Court is supposed to be about and what Justice, Chief Justice Roberts would tell you if you were here is he said, again, you guys, correct me if I'm wrong here, but what he says is we are not Democrats, we are not Republicans, we just look at the Constitution and do our best to render decisions. Is that his party line?

Balls and strikes, he calls balls and strikes.

Right. That's all. And they're all impartial and so forth and so on. I don't know if that was ever the case, but that most certainly really is not the case right now. You have a very partisan Supreme Court. It is now 5 to 4 Republican majority. And Trump as an example, and he's certainly not the only one looked to the Federalist Society for his list of potential nominees. And the Federalist Society is a well funded, a right wing Republican organization who has submitted names not only for the Supreme Court but for lower courts as well. People who are almost always anti a woman's right to control her own body, anti worker, anti environment. Am I correct in saying that that's who they are? But the idea of packing the court like Roosevelt tried to do in 1938 is not something I support because if I'm elected President, you got five, four Republicans, so to speak. And I give you two more progressives makes it six, five, you know, 10 years later or whatever, the guy who comes or the woman who comes after me, they got a pack. They got to pack it again. So we'll end up with 800 people on the Supreme Court, and every election there'll be, you know, I don't think that's the way to go. This is a tough issue, and no one has the magical answer, I think. And again, I'm talking to. People know more about this stuff than I do. But I think there is an argument to be made by some constitutional specialists. Some people who know the Constitution is that we guarantee lifetime appointment to a federal judge, but that doesn't mean that judge has got to stay on the Supreme Court. So you can have a situation where you rotate judges, you don't take them off the court system, but you can rotate them out of the Supreme Court into an appeals court or another court. And that seems to me to be something we would like to look at. All right, let me just say this if I can conclude. First of all, I want to thank Larry and Zephyr for not only being here today, these guys are dealing with some of the most important issues facing our country. And they're not necessarily the sexiest issues, but they are fundamental issues about the state of American democracy. And this is a fantastic turnout. And it says to me that here in New Hampshire, people are interested in this issue, and we must be interested in this issue, because I think all of us, no matter what our view may be, and I say there are conservatives out there who hold a different point of view than I do, but they believe in democracy. They believe in the right of people to be able to control their own destinies through the ballot box, not by killing other people, not by wars, but by voting. And this country has struggled, as I mentioned earlier, for hundreds of years to ext. Expand democracy. All people have the right to vote, no matter what the color of your skin is. All right? And it is a sad state of affairs that as a result of a recent Supreme Court decision gutting the Voting Rights act, you have states moving in exactly the wrong direction. So I would hope that regardless of the political views of anybody in this room, whether you're conservative, progressive, you're for Bernie Sanders, you're for anybody else. All right, let us go forward with the noble task of revitalizing American democracy, creating a system of one person, one vote, not big money buying elections, and going forward so that we can proudly show the rest of the world what real democracy is about by having the highest voter turnout rate of any country on earth. Thank you all very much.

Democracy Reformer thank you very much. Sa.