>> a lot to watch on c-span this weekend. coming up tomorrow, we will also iowa andn c-span at this will be the iowa state fair soapbox and that continues. you can see some guests. that includes bobby jindal and governor christie. on c-span 2, we will be live at the mississippi book festival. that begins at 11:30 a.m. "reel america" is on

at 4:00 eastern time. on of that this weekend c-span network. >> with the senate in its august break, we will feature book tv programming in primetime on c-span 2. saturday, we are alive from jackson, mississippi, for the mississippi book festival. discussions on harper lee, civil rights, and the civil war. on saturday, september 5, we are alive from the nation's capital for the national book festival. followed on sunday with our live in depth program. tv on c-span 2, television for serious readers.

>> bernie sanders spoke to supporters at a rally in columbia, south carolina, following his remarks, he also took some questions from viewers. this is just under two hours. how are you doing? all right. this is the last stop of the evening. we are excited to be in columbia, south carolina. i have the privilege of serving as the national press secretary for bernie 2016.

i will be your mc for this evening. before i bring out the man of the hour, i want to chat with you all. did you know, america celebrated the 50th anniversary of the voting rights act? the voting rights act was a civil rights moment, landmark legislation. and we acknowledge how far we have come. but the supreme court 2013 decision getting the voting rights act was a shameful step backwards. it was. today we know our voting rights, family values, the quality of education and a black lives are under attack. we know we still have work to do. we need people we trust at

leading this country to get the work done. am i right? am i right? we need new voices that are not afraid to speak truth about the injustices plaguing people of color and the plight of everyday hard-working americans. we need people who know the critical civil rights law which protected voters in places with a history of discrimination is as necessary today as it was during the jim crow era. we need people who understand economic inequality and racial inequality are parallel issues that must be addressed simultaneously. people who are committed to reforming the juvenile justice and criminal justice system so we are not locking up all generations of people. but we are instead ending the disgrace that is the mass incarceration of

african-americans in this country. people who truly believe and are working to ensure every single young person in this country receives a shot at a quality affordable education. people like bernie sanders. if you believe like i do that bernie sanders is the candidate for president we need in this country, there are a few things i want to encourage you to do. you have taken the first very important step up by attending this town hall. thank you for being here. give yourselves a round of applause. [applause] >> this passion you feel, this burn, we want you to visit our

website. sign up to volunteer. donate to the campaign. the second thing you can do to get involved is you can text to bernie to 82623. that will give you real time updates. the last thing you can do is follow us on twitter. @berniesanders on twitter. this is really about spreading this message, this multiracial revolution, this fight for criminal justice reform. for social justice. economic justice. racial justice.

are you ready? are you ready? [applause] >> at this point in time, it is my pleasure and honor to introduce to you the next president of the united states, united states senator bernie sanders. [applause] ♪ [applause]

mr. sanders: thank you. doesn't look like we could squeeze too many more people in this room. and let me say thank you to the hundreds of people in the overflow room. [applause] mr. sanders: we began this campaign about 3.5 months ago. when we began this campaign, people were saying bernie sanders, interesting guy but kind of a fringe type candidate. i mean no one takes it seriously the idea that maybe, just maybe, we need a political revolution in america. [applause] [applause]

mr. sanders: maybe, just maybe, something is wrong when almost all of the new income is going to the top 1%. [applause] maybe, just maybe, something is wrong when we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country and more people in jail than any other major country. [applause] all over the country, in new hampshire and iowa, all over the country, thousands of people started coming out. a couple of weeks ago, we were on the west coast and we had 15,000 people in seattle. 28,000 people in portland, oregon.

and we had 27,000 people in los angeles. it seems to me the ideas we are talking about are not fringe ideas, they are the ideas that the american people support. [applause] this is a campaign on the move. this is a campaign that is going to win in south carolina and across the country. but the enthusiasm and the excitement for this campaign hasn't just launched turnouts. people also understand there is

something profoundly wrong when millionaires and billionaires control our political system. [applause] mr. sanders: let me be very clear. i do not represent the billionaires' agenda. i do not want their money. we are not going to have any superpac at all. [applause] mr. sanders: we are raising money for this campaign in the old-fashioned way, small contributions from 400,000

americans. average contribution, $31. i'm proud of that. what this campaign is about is bringing people together with the understanding that if we do not allow ourselves to be divided, if we stand together as black and white and hispanic, native american, men and women, straight and gay, nativeborn and immigrant -- [applause] if we stand together, they may have all the money and all of the power. but we have the people. when people stand together, we win. where ever i go around the

country, media come up to me and say, we are surprised, why is there so much excitement and enthusiasm? why are you moving up in the polls? let me tell you what my answer is to them. my answer is the american people are sick and tired with establishment politics. [applause] mr. sanders: they are sick and tired with establishment economics. and frankly, they are sick and tired of establishment media. [applause] the people of our country fully

understand that corporate greed, this never ending greed of needing more and more no matter how much they have, that corporate greed is destroying our economy. [applause] [applause] mr. sanders: and they also understand, and i speak here as the former chairman of the senate veterans committee, the american people understand that men and women throughout our history have put their lives on the line and sometimes lost

their lives defending democracy and that there is something profoundly wrong when billionaires are buying elections. that is not democracy. [applause] the american people also understand that at a time when this country faces so many enormous problems, when we need serious discussion, that much of the corporate media will talk about everything in the world except the most important issues facing working americans. [applause] let me be as clear as i can be. this campaign is not about bernie sanders or hillary clinton. it is not about donald trump, jeb bush or anyone else.

it is about you, your kids, your parents, and the future of this country. [applause] >> bernie, bernie, bernie. mr. sanders: as someone who has run for office a number of times in vermont, i have never run a negative political ad in my life. [applause] because i believe that what politics and a democracy is about is to take a hard look at the serious problems facing our country and propose ideas and let the american people discuss them. i think it is absurd for politicians to say, i am great, i am wonderful, everyone else is

terrible. that is wrong. what we need is a serious discussion about the serious issues facing our country and that is what this campaign is about. [applause] mr. sanders: our campaign is different from other campaigns, not only in terms of the fact that it we have the most progressive vision, but more importantly in how we are running this campaign. i believe, and let me be honest with you and tell you what no other candidate for president will tell you, that no matter who is elected president of the united states, no matter how good he or she may be, that person cannot address the enormous problems facing working families and the middle class because of the power of big money interests in this country.

[applause] that is the truth and it is an uncomfortable truth. what i am calling for is not just your support to elect to me as president, i'm asking you to be part of a political revolution. [applause] a revolution which transforms our country economically, politically, socially, and environmentally. [applause] let me tell you what this political movement is about.

[applause] thank you. i love you, too. [applause] what this political movement is about is millions of people from coast to coast, standing up and saying loudly and clearly, enough is enough. this great nation and our government belong to all of us, not just to a handful of billionaires. [applause]

the truth is, the sad truth, the truth is our country faces more serious problems than at any time in the modern history of our country. and if you throw in the global crisis of climate change, the problems may be worse today. [applause] but we are not going to solve the problems unless we address those problems. [applause] let me take this opportunity to talk a little bit about some of the major problems facing our country. i started with the issue of income and wealth inequality.

today, as some of you know, we live in the wealthiest country in the history of the world. the wealthiest country in the history of the world. most americans don't understand that, don't perceive that, don't feel that because they are too busy working two or three jobs while the rest are going to the top 1%. [applause] mr. sanders: the truth is the united states today has more income and wealth inequality than any other major industrialized nation on earth. the inequality today if you can believe it is worse than at any time since 1928.

so what is essentially happening in our country, the people at the top are getting richer and richer. everybody else is becoming poorer and poorer. the truth is no great nation can survive economically or politically when so few have so much and so many have so little. [applause] there is something profoundly wrong and profoundly immoral. by the way, i think it is important we start injecting morality into our political discourse. [applause]

there is something profoundly wrong when the top 1/10 of 1%. not 1%, 1/10 of 1% owns almost as much[,] as much wealth as the bottom 90%. there is something profoundly wrong when in recent years we have seen a proliferation of millionaires and billionaires but all over our country, millions of people are working longer hours for lower wages. we end up with the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country on earth. there is something profoundly wrong when one family, one family, this is america not paraguay, not some small third world country, when one family,

the walton family of walmart, owns more wealth than the bottom 40% of the american people. [applause] when millions of people are working longer hours for lower wages. when people are working two or three jobs, trying to get some income and health care to take care of their families. when that is going on, well, a handfull of billionaires are making out like bandits. this is a rigged economy. [applause] mr. sanders: together, you and i and millions of other americans are going to change that.

we are going to create an economy that works with the middle class and working families, not just a handful of billionaires. [applause] this campaign is sending a simple and straightforward message to the billionaire class. that is you cannot, you will not have it all. [applause] the ceos of large corporations and billionaire class are not going to continue to get huge tax breaks when children in america go hungry.

[applause] they are not going to continue to send our jobs to china and other low-wage countries when millions of americans are in desperate need of work right here. [applause] mr. sanders: corporate america and the billionaire class are not going to hide their many billions in profits by putting them in the cayman islands and other tax havens. they are going to start paying their fair share of taxes. [applause] whether they like it or not, their greed is going to end because we are going to end it for them. [applause]

when we talk about the grotesque level of income and wealth inequality, let me bring it on home to what it means for the people in south carolina. in the last two years, the wealthiest 14 people in america, 14 people, saw their wealth increase by $156 billion. here in south carolina, while 14 people saw an unbelievable increase in their wealth, 27% of the children here are living in poverty. almost 300,000 children. 14 people increased wealth $156 billion.

27% of the kids in south carolina living in poverty. of those children living in poverty, 138,000 are black, 95,000 are white and 34,000 are hispanic. childhood poverty impacts people all across the board. it is a national disgrace. [applause] here is the reality. let's lay it on the table. billionaires become richer while children in south carolina and all over america lack adequate nutrition. in the year 2015 in south carolina, in vermont and throughout america, children are going hungry. it is not acceptable that billionaires become richer when

kids in this country are starving. [applause] if we are a moral people, we give the most vulnerable people in our society. to turn our backs on the children while billionaires get

richer is not what this country is supposed to be about. [applause] when we talk about human rights and when we talk about basic needs, let us not forget that we are the only major industrialized country on earth that does not guarantee health care to all people as a right. [applause] now i live in burlington, vermont, an hour away from the canadian border. the canadians guarantee health care to every people. in the u.k., they guarantee

health care to all of their people. germany, france, scandinavia does it. every major country does it accept us and that is why i strongly believe in a medicare for all. [applause] i believe in single payment but that is not what congress believes in, but the congress did pass, and the president did find, the affordable care act. a modest but important step forward. by expanding eligibility for medicaid, millions of americans now have health insurance who

previously lacked it. that is a good thing. [applause] the affordable care act, for example, has cut arkansas' uninsured population almost in half. it has reduced the number of uninsured in kentucky from 20% to 12%. in south carolina, in south carolina, over 200,000 people would gain health insurance if the governor and legislature approved the expansion. [applause]

not only would several hundred thousand people gain health insurance, the state would create tens of thousands of decent paying jobs. [applause] and the federal government picks up almost all of the bill. pretty good deal. [applause] in my view, it is terribly wrong to allow a rigid, right-wing, political ideology to stand in the way of health care for hundreds of thousands of south carolinians. [applause] it is wrong to allow hundreds of people in your beautiful state

to die unnecessarily because they cannot go to a doctor when they should. it is wrong and immoral to have a situation where people will suffer and become much sicker than they otherwise would have been because they don't have medicaid. that is wrong. [applause] and i would hope very much that not only here in south carolina, but all across this country, republican governors and legislatures would let go for one minute of the right wing ideology and take care of the people of their state. [applause]

i understand that some of these legislatures and governors hate president obama. you can hate president obama, but do not hate the kids and the working families in your state. [applause] mr. sanders: the issues we are talking about are not just the grotesque level of income inequality. it is the realities that for the last 40 years the great middle class of our country, once the envy of the world, has been disappearing. the truth is we are much better off economically today than we were when george bush left office. [applause] let us not forget that when bush

left office, we were hemorrhaging 800,000 jobs a month. our financial system was on the verge of collapse and we were running up a $1.4 trillion deficit. i find it interesting republicans complain they are only growing 250,000 jobs a month. that is a lot better than losing 800,000 jobs. [applause] mr. sanders: here is the point -- yes, we are better off today than we were when bush left office, but the reality is that millions of americans today are working longer hours for lower wages. all of you know there has been an explosion in technology making workers far more

productive than they used to be. and yet, many of those workers have seen their real wages go down. since 1999, medium family income today is almost $5,000 less than it was in 1999. that is our reality. we are better off than we were 6.5 years ago but we continue to find and see the disappearance of our middle-class. what we have to do is come up with proposal after proposal that rebuilds the crumbling middle-class in this country and that is what we intend to do. [applause] let me tell you something that very few people will tell you.

every month, the u.s. government comes out with things. unemployment in america is 5.3%. wrong. that official statistic does not include the people that have given up looking for work and the millions of people working part-time. add that altogether, real unemployment is over 10%. this is really something that we must deal with. we cannot continue to push under the rug. i asked the economic policy institute to do a study on youth unemployment. you know what it is in this country? in terms of kid to have no jobs, or are working part-time when they want to work full-time, what they told us is the kids 17 to 20 who graduated high school, if they were white, youth unemployment is 33%. if they were hispanic, youth unemployment is 36%.

if they were african-american, youth unemployment is 51%. [booing] we are turning our backs on an entire generation of young people who want to stand on their own two feet. [applause] let me tell you something else. one of the great shames in our country, one of the great international embarrassment is we as a nation have more people in jail than any other country. [applause] china, a nation three times larger than us, a communist, authoritarian country has fewer people in jail than we do. if anybody here thinks there is not a connection between huge

rates of youth unemployment and kids that end up in jail, you would be very mistaken. right now, right now, in my state, your state, we are 5.5 million young people who are not in school, who are not working, who are hanging out in street corners and getting into trouble. in my view, it makes a lot more sense for us to be investing in education and in jobs. [applause] it makes more sense to be investing in our young people than in jails and incarceration.

[applause] when we talk about the economy, it is not just income and wealth inequality and it is not just high rates of unemployment we have to address. it is the simple fact that everybody in this room knows that millions of our people are working at wages that are too damn low. [applause] the current minimum wage at the federal level of $7.25 an hour, $7.25 an hour --

[booing] mr. sanders: -- is a starvation wage. our job is to raise the federal minimum wage to a living wage -- $15 an hour over the next several years. [applause] it is not a radical idea to say that if somebody works 40 hours a week, that person should not be living in poverty. [applause] when we talk about fairness in wages, i hope very much that every man in this room will stand with the women and pay equity for women workers.

[applause] there are too many women in america trying to bring up their families who are making $.78 on the dollar compared to men. pay equity will take a huge chunk out of poverty in america and we must fight to establish pay equity. [applause] i think all of you know that many of my republican colleagues

run around the country and they talk about family values. they just love families. but, you know, you all know what they mean when they talk about family values. what they are saying is women in america should not be able to control their own bodies. i disagree. [applause] what they are saying in their concept of family values is that women are too dumb to be able to buy the contraceptive they need. i disagree.

what they are also saying in their understanding of family values is that are gay brothers and sisters should not be able to get married and enjoy all of the benefits of american citizenship. i disagree. [applause] i am very fortunate to have four kids, seven grandchildren. jane and i have been married for 27 years. [applause] we believe, we believe in family and we believe in strongly protecting the needs of

families, but my family values are a little bit different than republican family values. [applause] when i talk about family values, i believe that the united states must end the international embarrassment of being the only, only major country on earth that does not guarantee workers paid medical and family leave. [applause] when a woman has a baby today, if she has the income and the financial support, she can stay home and get to love her baby, bond with her baby. for those of us who are parents, it is one of the most amazing experiences of being human.

[applause] it is pretty important for the baby as well. [laughter] that is a family value. it is a family value when mom stays home, nourishes the baby, gets to know her baby and dad is there as well. it is not a family value to tell that mom that just because you don't have money, you have to separate yourself from your baby and go back to work in five days or eight days. that is not a family value. [applause] and that is why i have supported and will fight for legislation that guarantees every family in america 12 weeks of paid family or medical leave. [applause]

that is a family value. if every other major country on earth could do it, the united states of america could do it, too. [applause] by the way, we remain the only major country on earth that does not guarantee sick time to our workers or paid vacation. that has got to change, too. [applause] with real unemployment over 10%, youth unemployment much higher than that, we need on major federal jobs program to put millions of people back to work. [applause]

at a time when our infrastructure is crumbling, our roads, our bridges, our water systems, waste water plants, airports, levies, dams -- there is more than enough work to do. a $1 trillion investment over five years could create over 13 million decent paying jobs. [applause] but when we talk about -- it is not only the absolute imperative of having to create millions of jobs, it is also the absolute need to prevent the loss of more jobs because of our disastrous trade policies.

[applause] you are looking at a senator and a former member of the house who voted against nafta, capfa, and trade relations with china. [applause] and you are looking at a senator who will help lead the effort against the transpacific partnership. [applause] we need, we need trade policies which create jobs in america, not in countries around the world. [applause] mr. sanders: and when we use

words like greed and recklessness and arrogance and dishonesty, we only have some of the adjectives to describe wall street. all of you know that as a result of the greed and recklessness of wall street, our economy was brought to its knees, millions of people lost their jobs, their houses and their life savings. today, after bailing out wall street because they were too big to fail, three out of the four largest banks are bigger now than they were before we bailed them out. [booing] mr. sanders: in my view -- let me be very clear about this -- when you have six banks issuing two thirds of the credit cards in this country, 35% of the

mortgages in this country, when you have banks that are too big to fail, they are too big to exist. [applause] mr. sanders: we need a financial system which provides affordable loans to small and medium-sized businesses so they can create the jobs we need. we do not need a financial system on wall street which is an island unto itself which is only concerned about profits for a handful of people. [applause]

i am often asked, well, bernie, which of the issues out there is the most important and it is impossible to answer because all of these issues are enormously important. here is one issue that impacts every other issue and that is five years ago, as you all know, the supreme court by a 5-4 decision in the citizens united -- [booing] mr. sanders: in the citizens united case, what they said to the wealthiest people in the country, they said you guys already own much of the economy. we are now going to allow you to own the united states government and that is exactly what they are trying to do right now. we have a situation right now where one family, the extreme right wing koch brothers. [booing]

mr. sanders: the second wealthiest family in america is prepared to spend $900 million in this election cycle. that is more money than either party will spend. when you have one family spending more money than either of the major political parties, that is not democracy. that is oligarchy. [applause] mr. sanders: i have not made

many campaign promises, but this is one i have made and will repeat to you. no nominee of mine to the united states supreme court will get that position unless he or she is loud and clear in saying that one of their first orders of business will in fact be re-hear and to overturn citizens united. [applause] mr. sanders: i am a passionate believer in democracy. i really believe in democracy. and what that means, what that very radical idea means -- only a few hundred years old -- what that idea means is that you and people all over this