Bernie Sanders warns of ‘extraordinary danger’ facing U.S. under Trump at LA rally
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., told a crowd of thousands at a rally in Los Angeles on Saturday that the U.S. was facing a moment of “extraordinary danger” as he criticized the political, economic and social policies of President Donald Trump.
Sanders, who also dropped by the music festival Coachella over the weekend, has been criss-crossing the U.S. to speak out against the new Republican administration.
“We are living in a moment of extraordinary danger,” he said, “and how we respond to this moment will not only impact our lives but will impact the lives of our kids and future generations.”
On the latest stop of his national “Fight Oligarchy” tour, the lawmaker criticized what he sees as Trump’s efforts to advance the interests of billionaire businesspeople over those of the working class.
“I’m no longer talking about how we’re moving to oligarchy,” Sanders told the crowd. “I’m talking about how we are living today in an oligarchic form of society.”
The same night but on the opposite coast, Trump attended the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) event at the Kaseya Center in Miami, where the crowd erupted in applause as he entered and shouted chants of “U.S.A.”
He told reporters on his way back to the White House that he felt validated by the reception.
“It says we’re doing a good job,” Trump said on Air Force One early Sunday morning. “If we weren’t doing a good job, we’d get the opposite.”
The tone was starkly different at Sanders’ rally earlier Saturday, which his team said was his largest yet with some 36,000 supporters in attendance. Musical icons Joan Baez and Neil Young were among the performers, in an event that lasted for over five hours.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., another leading Trump critic who has been joining Sanders on the tour, said at the rally that corporate interests and lobbyists have an outsize influence on modern American life, driving wealth inequality and making it increasingly challenging for workers to get by.
“The feeling of the water rising up to our throats, the impossibility to afford anything easily, the fear of speaking up, the deeply bitter and toxic division driven more by algorithms on social media than individual thought, the crumbling of our rights and protections,” Ocasio-Cortez said, “understand that all of this is what it means and what it feels like to be governed by billionaires.”
Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez will make additional stops on the tour this week in Idaho, California and Montana.
Zohran Mamdani sworn in as New York City mayor, capping historic rise
Mayor Zohran Mamdani took the oath of office in New York City after midnight Thursday. The city's first Muslim mayor, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, has promised to focus on affordability and fairness.
Rising from the ashes, a symbol of hope at the Rose Parade
Survivors of the Eaton and Palisades Fires find healing and community working on a Rose Parade float to honor the lives and communities lost in last year's wildfires.
The history behind the NYC subway station chosen for Mamdani’s swearing-in
The city shut down the station in 1945 on New Year's Eve. Eighty years later, it's a symbolic venue choice for the incoming mayor's private swearing-in ceremony.
U.S. military strikes 5 more alleged drug boats, killing 8
The U.S. military says it struck five alleged drug-smuggling boats over two days. The attacks killed eight people, while others jumped overboard and may have survived. U.S. Southern Command did not reveal where the attacks occurred.
Capitol riot ‘does not happen’ without Trump, Jack Smith told Congress
Former special counsel Jack Smith also described President Trump as the "most culpable and most responsible person" in the criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election results, according to a transcript of Smith's closed-door interview with the House Judiciary Committee.
Trump will drop push for National Guard deployments in Chicago, LA and Portland, Ore.
Courts blocked troops from deploying in Chicago and Portland, Ore., and the Los Angeles deployment effectively ended after a judge blocked it earlier this month.
