Bernie Sanders

I am not overly impressed by a squad of media running around saying, what do you think about the tattoo on Graham Platner's chest?

He went into a dark period in his life.

I suspect that Graham Platner is not the only American to have gone through a dark period.

But what he did was he expressed his darkness on the internet.

Probably not a brilliant thing to do, all right?

And I think as a nation, especially given the fact that we have a president who is convicted of 34 felonies, maybe we have to do a little bit of forgiveness.

October 18th, 2025, there are more people out on the streets in more communities all over our country than we have ever seen in American history.

So today, right now, I say to my Republican colleagues, come back from your month-long vacation.

Start negotiating and do not allow the American healthcare system to be destroyed.

End this shutdown.

It throughout our country and rips up union contracts that workers have fought for and won.

It is in danger when we have a president who grossly violates the Constitution by accepting gifts from foreign leaders, including a $400 million plane from the royal family of Qatar, and then allows that family to build an Air Force facility in Idaho.

Let me cut to the chase and tell you exactly what this shutdown is all about.

As a result of Trump's big, beautiful, disgraceful bill, which made massive cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act,

15 million, 15 million low-income and working-class Americans are going to lose the healthcare they desperately need to stay alive.

And my friends, studies suggest that when you throw those 15 million people off of the healthcare they presently have,

50,000 of them will die unnecessarily every single year.

50,000 Americans will die unnecessarily every single year.

But that's not all.

As a result of that same terrible piece of legislation, over 20 million Americans are going to see on average a doubling of their health insurance premiums through the Affordable Care Act.