January 18, 2017

Bernie Sanders Just Roasted Trump’s Billionaire Pick for Education Secretary

“Do you think that if you were not a multibillionaire…that you would be sitting here today?”


Early on in Betsy DeVos’ confirmation hearing to become President-elect Donald Trump’s education secretary Tuesday afternoon, Sen. Bernie Sanders sized up the wealthy philanthropist and let loose: “Do you think that if you were not a multibillionaire, if your family had not made hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions, that you would be sitting here today?”

As my colleague Andy Kroll wrote in 2014, “the DeVoses sit alongside the Kochs, the Bradleys, and the Coorses as founding members of the modern conservative movement.” And as MoJo‘s Kristina Rizga documented in her new in-depth investigation, Betsy DeVos has been a fervent supporter of the Republican push for charter schools and vouchers—with a particular interest in, as Rizga puts it, “building God’s Kingdom through education.”

Watch DeVos’ confirmation hearing response—and Sanders’ continued grilling about free college education and tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans—below:

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