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The 2017 Pension Political Power 25: Bernie Sanders

No. 24. Bernie Sanders, U.S. Senator

ByPeter Vasiliev

February 14, 2017

<25 Top Pension Power Players

24. Bernie Sanders

U.S. Senator

A longtime socialist congressman from Vermont, Bernie Sanders catapulted to national fame with his 2016 bid to become the Democratic presidential candidate. He garnered support in the Rust Belt states, which defied their traditional patterns to provide the swing votes that put Donald Trump in power. Sanders’ strength among these Trump backers makes him the most important voice in the populist opposition to the GOP in the Senate, which he joined in 2007. Though Sanders caucuses with the Democrats, his socialist views have often put him at odds with the party’s mainstream — as he was in 2015, when he introduced a bill to reverse the effects of the 2014 Kline–Miller Multiemployer Pension Reform Act, which is set to result in deep pension cuts for retirees and workers in struggling multiemployer corporate pension plans. Sanders, 75, is expected to reintroduce that legislation. In the 2017–’18 Congress, he will be the ranking member of the powerful Senate Committee on the Budget, where the Pension Guaranty Benefit Corp. is likely to be on the chopping block.— Michelle Celarier

The 2017 Pension Political Power 25