Bernie Sanders gave Washington whiplash this week — and it was all part of his plan.
Barely 24 hours after the Vermont senator publicly rejected a $3.5 trillion spending deal following a Monday meeting with President Joe Biden, he turned around to tout it as the most transformational policy proposal in nearly 100 years.
The shift in tone was a tactic Sanders used to coax moderate Democrats into going far higher than they might have otherwise felt comfortable. After he had insisted on shooting for the moon with a $6 trillion budget proposal, $3.5 trillion suddenly looked pretty reasonable.
Still, the Independent from Vermont isn’t quite ready for the “P” label.
“It’s not that I’m more pragmatic. It’s that there are 50 members of the Democratic Caucus. And unfortunately not all of them agree with me on everything,” Sanders said in an interview.