shy, they didn't look on paper, because they had never voted or voted democraticically. host: kellyanne, thanks for joining us. [applause] follow the transition of government on c-span as donald trump he comes the 45th president of the united states and republicans maintain control of the u.s. house and senate. we take you to key events without interruption. orch on c-span, c-span.org, listen on our free c-span radio app. the presidential transition process continues for donald trump. he is meeting with one of his biggest critics during the campaign, former massachusetts governor and 2012 presidential candidate mitt romney.

they are meaning in new jersey to discuss the transition process. some reports suggest mitt romney is being considered for a cabinet position. president obama is in peru are the last stop on his overseas trip before leaving office. he will meet with students in lima, peru. looking ahead tomorrow, the president holds a news conference at the economic summer and -- economic summit before coming back to the u.s. we are asking students to participate in the studentcam documentary competition by telling us what is the most our nextsue for president, donald trump, and congress to address in 27 team. the competition is open to all students six through 12.

they can work alone or in a group of up to three to produce a documentary on the topic selected. a grand prize of $5,000 go to the student or team with the best entry. $100,000 in prizes will be shared between 150 students and 53 teachers. the deadline is january 20, 2017, inauguration day. for more information go to studentcam.org. >> vermont senator bernie sanders speaks about the election results and his new role in senate number craddick leadership. he also talked about the state of the democratic party and what it needs to do going forward. from the christian science monitor, this is one hour.

>> ok, here we go. thank you for coming. our guest is bernie sanders, the senator from vermont and the new leader of the democratic senatorial leadership. his last visit was in june 2015, and we appreciate him coming back. we are pleased that jane sanders is joining us for our locale -- for our low calorie. our speaker was born in brooklyn, graduated from the university of chicago in 1968 and moved to vermont, worked as a carpenter and later a writer and was elected mayor of burlington.

served four terms. was elected a member of the u.s. house and then the u.s. senate and was overwhelmingly reelected in 2012. as this morning's crowd around the breakfast table underscores, senator sanders made a spirited run for the 2016 democratic presidential nomination. the subject of his new book, "our revolution: a future to , and and that ends the biographical portion of the program. now the compelling ground rules. as always, we are on the record. please, no live blogging or tweeting. there is no embargo on when the session ends. to help you curb that relentless selfie urge, we will e-mail several pictures of the session to all reporters here as soon as the breakfast will end. if you want to ask a question, please do the traditional thing and send me a subtle nonthreatening signal and i will happily call on as many

reporters as i can get to in the time we have with the senator this morning. i will limit myself to one question and ask you to try to do so. i realize that is probably hope over experience on my part. we will have opening comments and then questions. with that, thank you for doing this. sen. sanders: thank you for inviting me to be with you. i want to thank everybody for being here. to say the least these are , interesting times for our country. let me begin by telling you that just yesterday, my office from vermont, a small state, received many, many hundreds of telephone calls urging president-elect trump to withdraw his appointment of mr. bannon to be a major advisor to him. and i think what we're seeing

all over this country is extraordinary fear about the president who in his career before he ran for president led the so-called birther movement, which was a racist effort to undermine legitimacy of our first african-american president. there is great fear among the immigrant community that their families may be broken up and driven out of this country. there is fear of people of the muslim faith about what might happen to them. as i think everybody here knows, this country for hundreds of years has struggled with the issues of discrimination starting with our attitudes of the native american people. we have struggled with racism. we have struggled with sexism and homophobia. we have struggled with discrimination against italians

and irish and jews and everybody else. that has been our history. we have a right to be very proud that overcoming a lot of bigotry, we have moved forward to create a more less discriminatory society. i will tell you having been around this country over the last year, there is no generation in american history that is less discriminatory than is the young generation today. i would help very much that president-elect trump understands the fear and anxiety of his attitudes on race, on his attitude toward women, and would try to make the american people feel comfortable, more comfortable, and i hope he would do it by rescinding the nomination of mr. bannon. the second point i want to make is that mr. trump -- i would

like to get into this during the course of our discussion, campaigned as a populist. campaigned as somebody who was antiestablishment. i have zero doubt he received the support of many working-class people across this country because some of the positions that he took -- he said he is not going to cut social security. he is not going to cut medicare. he is not going to cut medicaid. well, i was glad to hear that. we look forward to working with him to make sure that he does not cut social security, medicare, and medicaid. he talked about raising the minimum wage to $10 an hour. that is not high enough for me, but it is better than $7.25 an hour, and we look forward to working with them to raise the minimum wage. during the campaign, he said a lot. we will find out soon enough whether what he said was sincere, whether in fact he is

prepared to take on the drug companies who charge us the highest prices in the world and moved to allow medicare to negotiate drug prices. he said a lot. our job is to hold him accountable. and we intend to do that. an issue that gets little discussion, but it happens to be one of the great planetary crises that we face. mr. trump campaigned as someone who believes that climate change is a "hoax." mr. trump is wrong. climate change is not a hoax. climate change, according to the scientific community, is one of the great threats to this planet. i would hope very much donald trump's nobody's fool. he is a smart guy. i would hope very much that he recognizes that that point of

view that he has is way out of touch with what the scientific community believes. i would hope he would bring scientists into his administration, into his office and discuss with them the threat of climate change and the need to transform our energy system away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency and sustainable energy. the future of the planet would rest on that. if the united states turns away from combating climate change, there is no reason to believe that china, russia, india, other large countries will not do the same. i would hope that mr. trump takes the time to listen to the scientific community. >> let me tell you who signed up so far.

that should hold as for the morning. >> thank you very much. senator, welcome. you said last night in answer to a question that maybe you could won against donald trump given his populist message, given your populist message. do you think you could have won? could you have won as a general election candidate and done well in the rustbelt? let me just follow by what do you think -- what do you think democrats need to do as a party now? sen. sanders: at the end of the book, there's a chapter on corporate media. the essence of it is that we spend too much time on political gossip, too little time

discussing the real issues facing the american people. so i'm not going -- it doesn't matter. i do not know if i could have won. who knows? it does not make much sense to me to be looking backward. right now this country faces enormous crises. we have a middle-class which is in decline. massive levels of inequality and a president-elect trump who concerns many, many people -- who, by the way, as you know, will have lost the popular vote to hillary clinton by as much as 2 million votes. i will answer the second question. i think it is time for soul-searching within the democratic party. the evidence is pretty clear that when you lose the white house in a campaign against a gentleman who i believe will

enter the white house as the least popular candidate in the history of this country, when you lose the senate, when you lose the house, when you lose two thirds of state governor's chairs in this country, when you have lost the 900 seats of legislatures around the country in the last eight years, i think it is time for the democratic party to reassess what it stands for and where it wants to go. i think at the end of the day, the democratic party has got to make a fundamental decision and it goes back to an old song of woody guthrie. some of you may have heard of woody guthrie. the song is "which side are you on?" in my view, it is not possible to be a candidate of corporate america, of the insurance companies or wall street, not take huge amounts of money from powerful special interests in

and say, well, i'm going to champion the needs of a declining middle class. i am going to champion the needs for working-class people and low income people. i don't think you can do that, and i think you have to make a decision as to which side you are on. i think at a time when the middle class is shrinking, your 43 million people living in poverty, when you mothers out there who cannot afford childcare, when you have millions of people getting ripped off by the pharmaceutical industry, the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people as a right, the only country to not provide paid family and medical leave, the time is now for the democratic party to say we will stand with the working families to take on the billionaire class, wall street, and the insurance companies. that is my view. >> we're going to go to kevin

hall, who i that has a budget question. >> an organization tries to not to the gossip, let's talk about the budget and you will be the ranking member. what is your expectation and what can you do to slow down a process -- is your expectation that we're going to blow holes in deficits? if you parse the words, it sounds like we're talking not trickle down, but similar to what kansas has tried with tax cuts. what you can do and what you're going to have to do. sen. sanders: if i indicated, and i think we can all agree, donald trump ran one of the most unusual campaigns and it turned out to be a very successful campaign. he said many things to many people. one of the things i think you will see, just to divert moment from the question, when he

talked about ideas that will improve life for working people like taking on the pharmaceutical industry or not cutting social security. you will see some of us working with him. but you are quite right. on the other hand, what he campaigned on, and i will call it trickle-down economics theory, giving huge -- if i may use that word -- [laughter] tax breaks to the very, very wealthiest people in this country and the largest corporations, and then, you know, just magically, which is the essence of trickle-down economic theories, all of these folks are going to reinvest in our economy, create jobs, see an increase in tax revenue and everybody lives happily ever after. it's a wonderful idea except it has never worked and i think it is an unfortunate idea. if the question is, will many of us vigorously combat the idea of trickle-down economic theory in

giving tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country and large profitable corporations, absolutely. i know we talked about tax reform. well, it is a funny thing. as you know, i've been running around this country for last year and a half talking about the grossly unfair tax system which benefits the wealthy and large corporations. then in one day during the campaign, donald trump did more to educate the american people about the unfairness of our his than i did in the year and a half. he went before the american people and said, i'm a multibillionaire. i have mansions all over the world. i live in the lap of luxury and i don't have to pay any federal income tax. and he told the american people just how unfair and how stupid our current tax system is. if i have anything to say about it, donald trump and is billionaire friends will start paying their fair share of taxes. we have to move to prevent corporations, not only in our

country but from all over the world, costing governments all over this world trillions of dollars in needed tax revenue. >> chuck? >> i would like to take your corporate media chapter into a postscript this morning. the last time i checked, you had 7 million followers are so on 2 twitter accounts, 5 million likes on facebook, that kind of thing. there has been discussion since the election about fake news on social media. buzz feed is out this morning with the store this has the final three months of the u.s. presidential election, the top-performing fake election news sites on facebook outperformed the 19 legitimate website, "new york times" and the like. facebook is $23 billion dollar company. it is larger than ge, walmart, and larger than a lot of american corporations. are you concerned about that phenomenon on the election?

fake news on the election. secondly, do put facebook the sphere of corporate media influence? sen. sanders: the figures you gave should concern all of us. i cannot give you a definitive answer. am i concerned? absolutely. i don't have to tell people in this room, you know better than i do, the changing face of the media in america. i have my concerns about the media, but the point you are raising is another whole area. there are millions and millions of people who are getting their information from fake news from people who have a very prejudice, non-fact based reality point of view. it is frightening. i can't give you a magical answer to how we deal with it, but it is very hard to be running a democracy or living in a democracy where you have a set of ideas that you just read on

the internet which have nothing to do with reality. in general. i did not need to make it personal. that is scary stuff. we can argue tax policy when we have a basic set of premises. you disagree, we go from there, that is democracy. it is a good thing. if you start off with a set of "facts" that have no basis in reality, we got trouble. you asked a very, very important question. i wish i could give you a better answer. it is something we have got to think about hard. >> are you using it as an organizing influence? are you exacerbating it? sen. sanders: no. do we use it? absolutely. is it fake news? no. i will not tell you everything we put out, that they were all correct, but we take seriously what we put out. do we use it as an organizing tool? of course. if i was going to speak in

california, we have a list of many thousands of californians in the area, will we alert them to the fact i am speaking? will we tell people some of the things i'm talking about? of course. that is a positive step. >> there is a lot of talk right now about who is the leader of the democratic party. do you consider your self to fill that role? if so, or if not, who is? also, are you planning to join the democratic party in your next election? sen. sanders: i will let others determine the leader. chuck schumer is -- i voted for chuck. i think chuck schumer is going to be doing an excellent job in a very, very difficult environment. and his job is to bring together the diverse points of view

within the democratic focus. nancy pelosi, if she is real or -- is reelected to that position or whoever is elected, will have an equally difficult job. those are the leaders of the congressional democratic party. we do not over the leader of the dnc will be. i'm supporting keith ellison because, as i mentioned a moment ago, i think it is time for the party to reform itself and become a grassroots party to take on big money interests. i was elected the last election as an independent and i will finish this term as an independent. >> francine kiefer. >> more on chuck schumer, the new leader of the democrats in the senate. a very open question and then a more focused one. just what are your hopes and concerns about chuck schumer as the leader of democrats and more pointedly, he has obviously deep ties to wall street and banking, antithetical to one of your points of view.

if you could address that as well. sen. sanders: chuck can more than ably speak for himself, so i'm not going to speak -- i'm sure you will have the opportunity to be chatting with chuck schumer and his views on all kinds of subjects. i have known chuck -- chuck and i were in the house together. i knew him a long time ago. we were both on the banking committee, financial services committee. chuck is in the best sense of the word a very good politician. he knows how to bring people together, how to seize the moment. this support, i believe, was unanimous. for any leader, whether you are a republican leader or democratic leader, yet the same has the same problem. how do you bring your divorce -- your diverse voices together? i think chuck is probably the best qualified person we have to do just that. >> can you do a sentence or two

on your new role as outreach chair? what does the outreach chair do? sen. sanders: if anyone has any ideas, let me know. [laughter] i mean, i just got this title yesterday. but -- but, it is actually something that i look forward to. and here is, without offending anyone in the room -- i know i never offend anyone -- the real action to transform america is not going to take place on capitol hill. it is going to take place at grassroots america. it is going to take place among millions of people who are struggling economically right now, young people, people concerned about the environment. and i initially understand my role to be to bring those people into the political process, to demand that the united states congress, the united states government, the new president represent the needs of all of the people and not just the

people on top. i am really excited. how we go about doing it, i don't know. the voter turnout was, 53%, 54%? which is low. it is low for us in recent years and much lower than other countries. why is it that tens of millions of or people, working people, young people do not get involved in the political process? certainly, one of the goals of that position to me is to bring people into politics and make people aware that politics is not just election day. election days are very, very important, but the other three -- the other 364 days of the year are also important. if you're concerned about racism or homophobia or climate change or income and wealth inequality, how do you get involved in the political process other than voting once every four years for president? there are ways and that is one

of the challenges that i will be looking to tackle. >> senator, i know you're very fond of what you call political gossip. i hope as a fellow vermonter you will give me some leeway on this. sen. sanders: where are you from and from aunt? born in burlington and raised in middle very. sen. sanders: you're ok. [laughter] >> you talk at the outset about the appointed of mr. bannon at the white house. i'm wondering how you think democrats should handle cabinet nominations and the real likelihood of a supreme court nomination that they will probably oppose on balance, the filibuster? sen. sanders: a great question and i cannot give you -- having been in leadership are all of one day -- [laughter] i cannot give you a definitive answer, but i think here are some of the areas that have to be taken into consideration.

let me be very clear. i happen to think that donald trump is a very smart person. he would not have been elected president if he was not a very smart person. i would hope very much -- also, i have no doubt in his way, he loves this country. and i would hope very much that given his background and given some of what i consider to be terrible, terrible things he has said on the campaign trail to minorities, i would hope that he understands he has an extraordinary opportunity, and unbelievable opportunity to say, you know what? i said things -- again, i do not say this as a criticism. mr. trump changes his views very often. that's fine. you all know that. the american people would be very anxious to hear him say, look, i said terrible things, i apologize. i'm not going to be a president leading a racist or a sexist or

homophobic or in islamaphobic administration. i want to focus on the real issues facing the american people, many of which he touched upon during his campaign. he talked about a collapsing working class in america. he is right. we're going to have to work together to address those issues. how do you create the millions of jobs that mr. trump correctly said we needed to correct? -- we needed to create. we're going to have to create. we're going to have to work together. how do you raise wages? he doesn't like obama care. presumably, he is not when you go to a single-payer program. i think that is the way we should be going. what is his idea? it is not enough to say i have a great idea or an excellent program. health care is fairly complicated and you have to go into the details a little bit more than saying he has an inlet idea. what is it? shall we join the rest of the world in guaranteed health care

for every man woman and child? he said during the campaign he was going to take on the pharmaceutical industry, which is a group ripping off the american people, charging us the highest prices in the world. i look forward to working with him. if he is serious about addressing those issues, it will be absolutely the right thing for him to do for so many reasons. to forget about the racism, forget about the islamophobia, forget about throwing millions of people out -- trying to throw millions of people out of this country. let's focus on the real issues we face. >> john wisniewski announced to his running for governor. are you going to support him? sen. sanders: i know john a little bit. i had the opportunity to meet john and i have a call that will , be made to john. i much appreciate the efforts he has made in new jersey. i may very well.

i have to talk to him and i have not. >> back in the cheap seats, cnn. >> i want to ask about one specific hard about trump's trade agenda. in his contract with the american voter, he called for establishing tariffs to impose them on companies to discourage them from laying off workers. do support imposing tariffs? sen. sanders: he said, among other things, when i was indiana a number of months ago during my campaign talking to the workers at united technologies, a home carrier, and mr. trump said he was going to make sure that those jobs stay in the united states -- if my memory is correct. he said that i think with nabisco as well. i think it is high time that corporate america understands that they cannot get the benefits of being american corporations while at the same time they are turning their backs on america's working class.

in the case of carrier, my recollection -- and i may not have it 100% right -- but i believe some years ago, not too many years ago, united technologies had the resources to provide $71 million severance package to its former ceo. $71 million. a golden parachute. and yet they think they can save some money by shutting down plants in indiana, moving to mexico and hiring people there for three dollars an hour. i will do everything i can to fight to stop those types of transactions. in that area, i look forward to working with mr. trump to tell corporate america, you know what? you cannot keep running all over the world whether it is china or vietnam or god knows where searching for the cheapest possible labor while you destroy the middle-class class and working class of this country.

i do look forward to coming up with ideas that tell corporate america -- tariffs may well be one of them, may well be one of those options. but i think corporate america, which is doing phenomenally well by and large, large corporations making huge profits, stashing their profits in the cayman islands. in a given year, corporations like generally and others will not pay a nickel in federal corporate taxes. that is absurd. if mr. trump has the guts to stand up to those corporations, demand they start paying their fair share of taxes, demand that they create jobs and protect jobs in america, he will have an ally with me. >> here comes newsmax with the two-pater. >> i do have a two-parter question about mr. trump's promises. one, what would you think of him or do you think of his vow to prosecute secretary clinton after the election?

and two, one issue in which he is a soulmate with you, and fact, the republican platform is a soulmate is the revival of the glass-steagall act. i cover the platform committee when it was put in there, and i called it the sanders amendment. is that something you want to work with him and other republicans on? sen. sanders: absolutely. you are right. he has talked about reestablishing glass-steagall. i think that is a step forward. without going into a great discourse here, i am one of those who does believe that financial deregulation brought about during the clinton regulation -- clinton administration, which allowed commercial banks and investment banks and large insurance companies to merge created the pathway forward to the collapse of 2008. i strongly believe we should

reestablish what we call a 21st century glass-steagall legislation. if mr. trump was sincere -- we're going to learn this pretty quickly, he said a whole lot of things. was he serious or were these just campaign slogans out there to gain some votes? >> [inaudible] sen. sanders: well, yes. the point i want to make is that we will hold him accountable. that is a very important issue. reestablishment of the 21st century glass-steagall is something i believe in. i think millions of americans believe in it. i would look forward to working with him. we will see whether he will keep his word and take on wall street in doing that. in terms of your other question, it would be a most beyond comprehension to think that a new president would be involved in the prosecution of his

opponent who ended up getting some 2 million more votes than he did. we read about these things and we see these things and nondemocratic countries all over the world. i mean, every year you all report on how some country around the world, wins an election and his opponent ends up in jail. this is the united states of america. we do not prosecute our political opponents and try to throw them in jail. that would completely, i think, -- completely divide this country. it would be an outrage. and i would hope very, very, very much that mr. trump understands that that is not something that he should do. >> josh from bloomberg. >> does the democratic already have a message that can reach working-class voters? in particular, the white

working-class voters who have abandoned the party en masse? sen. sanders: that is exactly -- it seems to me the democratic already has got to do are several things. first of all, we have got to build on the current base. we have got to be extraordinarily supportive of women who are fighting, among other things, for their right to control their own health needs, who are fighting for equal pay for equal work. we have got to be closely aligned and continue to work as part of a coalition with the african-american community who have their very, very serious concerns about high unemployment rates and african-american communities. we have to continue working with the latino community who are now under the gun in terms of some of the ideas that mr. trump brought forth during his campaign. and i should point out that the african-american communities,

the latino communities -- largely working-class communities. but of course we have to work with the white working class as well. the class that it personally come from, and that means that we have got to bring forth an economic message which says that we're going to raise the minimum wage through a living wage, in my view, $15 an hour, that we say to women whether you are black or white or latino or asian american, that you're going to get equal pay for equal work. that we are going to create millions of jobs by rebuilding our infrastructure, that you say to the white working class and the black working-class and the latino working-class that in today's world, in a competitive global economy, your kids have the right if they do well in high school and have the qualifications, to go to a public college or university tuition-free, that we address the crisis of health care in

which so many white workers, black workers, latino workers don't have health care coverage , paying high cost for prescription drugs -- in other words, to answer your question it is not either/or, it is , having an economic message that we will not allow the billionaire class and corporate america to get it all. that we're going to rebuild a disappearing middle class. but one of the problems democrats have had, in my view, is that they have made the point correctly that any objective assessment of the economy today tells us that we are far, far better than we were years ago when bush left office. no one in this room can deny that unemployment is much lower, that the deficit is much lower. on the other hand, what the democrats too often have

ignored, for 40 years, better off today than eight years ago, but over 40 years under the democratic and republican administration, the middle class in this country has been shrinking. real wages for american workers, white workers, have gone down. income inequality has gone up. too many people cannot afford health care, cannot afford to send the kids to college, cannot afford childcare. those are real issues in the democratic party has to address them. so to answer your question, absolutely, i think we can create a platform that appeals to white workers, black workers, latino workers, to women, and that is a platform that brings a vast majority of the american people together. >> a little louder for those like me who need it a little louder. >> you talked about you praised chuck schumer in the senate leadership election.

there has been, like, some grumbles about changes in house leadership. you are supporting a shakeup in the dnc. do you support shakeup in house leadership as well? sen. sanders: i served 16 years in the house. i am not there now and i will let the folks in the house make their own best decision. at the dnc -- again, here's the problem. i would hope media would pay more attention to this very serious problem. as a result of citizens united, we have situation, as you all know, billion years like the koch brothers and others, sheldon adelson, can pour sums of money into campaigns through independent expenditures. in the first chapter of the

book, we deal with that. we deal with what i fear is a growing movement, what oligarchy in this country, which not only impacts us economically, but politically. if anyone things that does not have an impact, i think you would be mistaken. here is something that worries me very, very much. that for many republican leaders, citizens united did not go far enough. the koch brothers have always believed their goal is to eliminate all campaign finance limitations and restrictions. so right now they can spend unlimited sums of money on independent expenditures. they want to go further and give a check for $1 billion to their candidate for president or whatever it is, $100 million to the candidate for the u.s. senate directly and control those campaigns. this is something that the dnc and our new leadership are going to have to deal with not only an opposing those outrageous,

undemocratic ideas, but in figuring out how we rally and bring the american people together at the grassroots level to make sure that money cannot buy elections. >> a quick time check, 9:48 and we are going to 10:02. we're not going to get to everyone. we will do the best we can. >> [inaudible] sen. sanders: it will not be a good united state senator -- [laughter] >> herb jackson. >> looking forward to 2020. can you give us your thoughts on who you might think would be -- -- would be your democratic standardbearer, and you have thoughts on cory booker? sen. sanders: review the last chapter on corporate media.

i think this is incredible. i have to say this in all due respect, are we ready echo we have not inaugurated this president and we're talking abou -- about 2020 because it is easy to write about. what about talking about climate change and whether the planet -- income inequality, youth unemployment and african-american communities of 30% to 40%. immigration reform, criminal justice reform? those are the issues the american people need to be engaged in. talking about who is running in 2080 -- you look like a good candidate. how much money do you have? i don't mean to be rude, but the american people are tired of that. they really are. they would like to hear serious discussion. who is running in 2020 or 2090 -- i have to tell you, people are turning off their tvs. they're tired of that. in all do respect, we have serious problems in this country and let's talk about the serious

issues and not worry who is going to be running and four years when we have not even inaugurated the president that just won. >> there is increasing pressure among various members of the democratic already for congressman ellison two steps down if he does when the chairmanship. is he able to be both a member of congress and the dnc chairman? able to be both a memr of congress and the dnc chairman? and, because i know it is a little bit of a presumptive question here, why is the pressure in discussion for him not to serve in those roles questionnaire is that reflective of debbie's tenure? sanders:: it is no great secret that i tell you that i do not think debbie wasserman schultz was not an outstanding chair of the democratic party, but not because she was a sitting member of the congress. inhave a lot of precedents the past, leaders were able to be full-time public officials.

on the other hand, the argument is a valid argument that especially now, it is a very time-consuming job. the way to deal with that, i think is you need to have the kind of staff that you need, the kind of director that you need to handle a whole lot of administrative work that needs to be done. so, to answer your question, do i think keith can remain a united states congressman and do the job, i do. but it is incumbent upon the new chair -- whether it is keith or anybody else, to put together a really dynamite staff. the second part of your question, this issue is certainly being raised. i do not believe it was raised when debbie took the job, and i think this is just a way for keith's of opponents -- the usual line is, oh, we love, keith, we think he is great, but

-- and that is the but. that is away for his opponents to criticize him and end up supporting somebody else. onam pleased keith has w support not just from progressives like myself or elizabeth warren. my recollection is over 500,000 people signed a petition supporting keith. that's a lot. and he has won support from people like chuck schumer and harry reid, so i think he has pretty broad support and i hope he makes it. jeff from cnn. jeff? one backward looking question if you do not mind. have you spoken to secretary clinton in the last week? what role do you believe she should play in rebuilding the party? as you said, she did when the most popular votes. and do you think your criticism

of her paid speeches played a role in her defeat? senator sanders: no, at the end of the day -- to answer your last question, i believe my candidacy was helpful to her if we believe that candidates should not be anointed. republicans had -- what was a? 17, 19 candidates for their position. i think an issue oriented campaign, one in which i am happy to say my campaign brought millions into the political process, the vast majority of whom ended up voting for a hillary clinton, i think it played a very positive role. i'm sorry, jeff, the other part of your question questionnaire >> have you talk -- >> if you have spoken to her -- >> i was in a conference call. she has a very important role to play. she got more votes than mr. trump. she was the democratic nominee. she haswithout saying an important role to play.

does that mean she and i are going to agree on every issue? likely, we are not going to agree on every issue, but her voice is an important voice and certainly needs to be heard. spoken to her? >> there was a conference call, i was involved with that. >> donald trump's election has , whichally killed tpp you support. you support renegotiating nafta and other trade agreements? senator sanders: we have a very large trade deficit. to me, the evidence is clear. maybe not every member of congress agrees, but we have lost millions of jobs as a trade of nafta and relations with china. you are right. i have been a leader in opposition to the tpp, and i'm glad to see, as i understand it, that it is dead. do i believe we have to's

fundamentally rethink our trade policies? i do. nornot here to say i think, have i ever thought, trade in itself is bad. trade is a good thing. and buyme we sit down something, we are essentially trading. i think trade is a good thing, but we need trade policies that work for the american worker and not just the ceo's of large multinational corporations. yeah, i think we should take a hard look at all of our trade policies and come up with a proposals.et of unfettered free trade which has been a disaster for millions of american workers. >> you said that you would work with president trump on

infrastructure and minimum wage. there is another school of thought is that democrats should be flat out oppositional to trump, following the way that mitch mcconnell and republicans dealt with president obama. could you speed to that? senator sanders: i think, as i have indicated, there are areas where, from my perspective, there can be no compromise. i will not compromise with racism. and i will not compromise with sexism and i will not compromise with islamophobia. what is deeply ingrained, i hope, in all of us, is the understanding that on many of the policy issues we have discussed this morning, on his people have different points of view. there e different points of view on trade. i do not think people are terrible human beings because they disagree with me on trade. that is their view. they disagree with me on health care. that's called democracy. that is a good thing.

there are areas where i would hope in the year 2016 we would have put the hind us, -- behind us, and that is to say we treat people with the quality, that in the year 2016, we are not going to discriminate against somebody because that person is a muslim or that person is a woman or that person is gay. i would hope in the year 2016 we had gone beyond that, that those are battles that have been won already and i will not retreat on those issues. on the other hand, if donald trump comes up with an idea or a program which he campaigned on that says that our infrastructure is crumbling, that we can create millions of jobs rebuilding our infrastructure, that we can put people back to work at decent wages, yeah, i will go to work. if he is consistent with his views that our trade policies have failed american workers,

yes, i will work with him. and the other area i will fight him tooth and nail is this issue we havete change, which got to focus much more attention on. the future of the planet is at stake. and we have got to bring together people to demand that mr. trump listen to the scientists, not the fossil fuel industry. >> we have four minutes left. quick last question from eric garcia from "the hill." a lot of talk about the fact one third of the county's vote for president obama went for mr. trump. a lot of people in michigan and ohio -- they voted on down ballot, did not vote for president. you say you want to get more people involved and get them out to vote. four democrats are up for reelection in pennsylvania, michigan, ohio, wisconsin in 2018.

do you think they have enough appeal to be able to win the election and you talk a lot about one of the things they can do to appeal to those white working-class voters that may have voted for obama in 2008 and 2012, but then broke for trump? senator sanders: i think the answer is i am not into speculation. i don't know what is going to happen in two years. but what i believe, and i have believed it from day one, is that the progressive vision of america, which is to say if you work 40 hours a week in this country you have to earn a living wage, i think when you talk about that, when you talk about pay equity for women, when you talk about creating millions of jobs by rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, when you talk about guaranteeing health care as a right and paid family and medical leave, when you talk about demanding that the wealthy and large corporations starting their fair share of taxes, when you talk about creating tons of jobs by transforming our energy system away from fossil fuels into

energy efficiency and sustainable energy -- if those candidates run on those issues, yes, they will win. >> i want to thank you for coming, sir. i want to thank mr. sanders for coming. [laughter] ok -- sanders: >> sorry. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.