 Welcome to all of you to the Montpellier Senior Activity Center. My name is Sarah Lipton. I am the current director here. And I'm delighted to have all of you, as well as AARP Vermont, our wonderful panelists, and of course, Senator Sanders. We are so delighted to be able to host this first of any hybrid events for a town hall, for this AARP town hall. The first time we've done this, you all get to be here in person, but there's 6,000 to 8,000 Vermonters, older adults, who are on the phone right now. So just a couple of logistical things before we get going. If you need a restroom, there is one singular restroom just back behind the wall over there. There are multiple restrooms for multiple genders out by the front door. There's delicious, beautiful food that our feast chef, Shalonda James, put together with help from someone of our wonderful volunteers. So please help yourself before or after. And I was going to say this to the side here, but maybe I'll just tell you. A couple of years ago, he came and visited our farm. Parks department here in Montpellier created a feast farm that grows produce for our Easter dinner meals program. And he came and visited, which was really fun. So I'm really happy to have him here again. And just to help a little logistics of how this is going to run, because as you now know, you are some of the lucky few person. And there's many people on the phone. So I'll just finish the logistical piece. So the questions are going to be happening primarily to folks that are from on the phone. And you'll hear just a moment. Gregory from ADRQ Vermont will be introducing folks and sort of fielding questions. There will be an opportunity for some folks in the room as well to be able to ask questions. So just stay tuned for that. And we appreciate your courtesy and allowing quiet in the room so that the folks that are on the phone can really hear. Because there's really more of them than there are you. So Senator, welcome. Thank you so much for joining us. I was remembering two years ago when you came to our farm, we had a great time. So thank you for coming back here. We're really happy to have you. Thank you all very much for coming out. I have been doing these Kelly town meetings with AARP for a number of years. And what they do is probably just around now, we got some entity that is causing up zillions of people throughout the state and saying, why didn't we town meeting with Bernie Sanders? They went the phone. We ended up getting a five to 10. Yeah, I'll keep reminding them all. Senator, thank you so much for joining us today. You're welcome. Good to be with you, Greg. So Senator, it would be wonderful if you could just provide some opening remarks as we hit L in the center. Okay, I will do. That's a good idea. I think I'll do it. Let me thank Greg and the Montpelier Senior Center for allowing us to use their facility. And is Greg an AARP? Well, no, we have been doing meetings like this for a number of years and generally speaking, the format has been that I chat for a while and I take questions. That's great. I enjoy doing that. But I wanted to change the format a little bit. Maybe change the focus a little bit. I'm prepared and happy to talk about all of the wonderful things that are going on in Washington, D.C. They got my chalk, right? And, but I wanted to do more than that today. I'm happy to answer any questions, obviously, that anybody on the phone has or anybody here has. And I will talk about some of those issues. But there's something else that I really wanted to talk about. And that is, I think that as a nation, we really do not discuss enough the aging process, what it means to get old, the options that older people have. I thought it was Mae West. You guys know who Mae West is? Yeah, right. The heads here are nodding. But it turned out to be Betty Davis. Everybody else, Betty Davis, the actress. And she said that old age is not for sissies. You're a lemon and it's true. You know, if you're a kid and you fall, you break your leg, it's not good. You recover easily. If you're 80 or 90 and you fall, it's another story in part. So old age is not for sissies. And I don't know that we discuss the difficult decisions that families and older people have to make. We don't really talk about it. Do you think I'm right on that or not? Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, and I wanted to discuss that maybe on a more personal level than we have in the past. And I also, and the reason we have these three guys up here who know more about these things than I do is I wanted to make sure that seniors in the state know about the programs that are available. Whether it is nutrition programs or senior citizen centers. I'm not sure that every senior in the state knows that what's available. We have three folks here who are very knowledgeable about that. I'm gonna get to them in a moment. But here's where I'm coming from. I'm thinking that if somebody is 80, 85, and let's just say, yeah, I've been married for a long time and you lose your spouse. What does that mean? That is incredibly traumatic. Is it not? And we all know people in that position. What options are available to you? If you're not getting along with your kids and you're getting up on years, where are you gonna get the advice that you need to make very difficult decisions? Is there kind of assisted living facilities available? How do you choose the nursing home that you might wanna end up going into? How do you negotiate and figure out and medicate? How are you gonna get into a nursing home? If you end up in the hospital and you come out of the hospital, how do you get the care that you need? Et cetera, et cetera. There are 1,000 issues that are out there. But I wanted to raise those issues a little bit this evening. And if folks who are listening to this wanna respond, that would be and tell their stories, that would be great. But then now we'll be just introduced to say a few words. I wanted to ask Meg Brameister, who's the executive director of the Northeast Kingdom Council on Aging. And it's really quite knowledgeable about the programs that are available. If, Meg, you're a senior out there like many seniors that get around a whole lot of money and you're struggling and maybe you're growing out of your home or maybe you need some nutrition service, maybe you just wanna socialize more than you are right now, what are the options that are available to you? So the state of Vermont's been very generous in developing the area agencies on aging and we've been around for over 50 years. And with that, it has the opportunity for us to have a helpline. So our helpline is 806-425-119. And that really is the way to start to explore the issues that are individual to you. And one of the things that we work on is having a helpline so that you get through that first layer of figuring out what your questions might be and who the expert within our agencies or within our community partners are to help you. And by calling that helpline and then working with options counselors or case managers, we can do an individual plan to help you figure out what things are important for you because we're all different and not everyone wants the same things as we age. All right, give that number again. And back, if you're in your kitchen right now, somewhere in Vermont, take your pencil out because you might wanna make this call but what's the number again? 806-425-119. Okay, thank you very much. Let me now introduce Kim Fitzgerald. Kim is the CEO of Cathedral Square. And I've known Cathedral Square in Burlington since I was mayor of Burlington. They go way, way back. They do a great job in terms not only of senior housing and people like Nancy Oldridge, I think have helped develop other programs. So maybe Kim talk a little bit about Sasha, the other kind of work that's seen as in the same Vermont, my benefit from. Yeah, absolutely. So yes, we're probably most known for our affordable housing and there is an affordable housing network throughout the state. So if you are looking for affordable housing, know that there are some throughout the state. Big thing to know is plan early. A lot of people don't realize they're very, very long wait list to get into affordable housing. I know our list has over 1,000 people waiting three to five years. So just wanna call that out right away. In addition, we do have Sasha which stands for support and services at home. It is a model of providing care and there's some services to help people stay in their homes. That is also statewide and it is free for Medicare beneficiaries. So I wanna call that out. We also have long-term care within our community. So we have two licensed assisted living just like independent, really important to get on the wait list. And another thing to really notice you while you're looking at different options, be sure that they keep you depending on your income changes. So in other words, if you're paying market for something and you lose income, a spouse passes away or your income changes or you've spent down on care, many places you have to physically move. So be sure to look into that as well. Thank you very much. I'm sure some questions will come. Do you have an 800 number that you've got? We do not have 800 ever. We make mostly websites. So stashvermont.org or cathedralsquare.org. Okay, good. Annie Hutchinson is a community outpatient registered dietitian at Gippen Healthcare, at random. And one of the chairman of the committee called the Health Education Labor Committee in the Senate. And we deal with the office on aging. And one of the points the guy there who runs it, who's very good, makes is we don't know enough about exercise and nutrition and how that prolongs life. Sift the little things. He says the most important thing that anybody can do, for example, when your elderly is to walk 15 minutes a day, that the studies show you walk 15 minutes a day and a little bit longer than others who don't. Nutrition obviously is also a very important part of that. Annie, you wanna say a little bit about what you do? Yeah, so I work with folks to develop eating plans that work best for them. I find one problem with the aging population tends to be that there is a lack of appetite. And so trying to nourish your body throughout the day is really important and there's lots of services, such as congregate meals at senior centers that can help folks feed themselves if you're a homebound meals on wheels is another great option. So I don't have that problem, I'm not having time. Some of us don't have that problem. Thank you. All right, let me say a few words to get over this and what's going on in Washington. We'll open it up, Greg, to anybody who wants to call us in. Good news is that social security calls went up by 8% last year, that's the largest increase I think in a long time. The reason for that obviously is those cost of living adjustments reflect inflation. So I think there was a generous increase and obviously it makes life easier for a lot of folks who are worried about food costs, prices of filling up your gas often and so forth and so on. An issue that is on a lot of people's minds is the debt ceiling debate that took place. Let me just say a word about that. The debt ceiling is not really, doesn't really have anything to do with the budget. The budget is what you're gonna spend next year. It literally has to do with whether or not you pay your bills, that's what it's about. The government for better or worse develops programs, incurs debt, and all of the debt ceiling says is we gotta pay our bills. So for the, and I'll be a little bit politically partisan here, but for the first time in the modern history of this country there was a faction of people in the Republican Party in the House who said, well, the hell with it so we don't pay our bills, so what? Well, like so what would have meant when the largest nation, the largest economy on earth does not pay its debt, it causes massive economic uncertainty not only in this country, but all over the world, interest rates would rise, businesses would not be investing, unemployment would go up. It would have been a kind of catastrophe, all right? So the idea that they were holding the world's economy in America's economy hostage was a very, very bad thing. My own personal view is that the president, we are going into all kinds of detail, had an option of using the 14th amendment of the US Constitution which gives the president the power in a sense to not what's called not question the public debt. We think that that could have paid the debt without having to go through Congress. To pay that as it may, the next thing that happened is the Republicans in the House came up with a piece of legislation which would have decimated the rather limited social safety net we have in this country right now. We do not do enough of the elderly, for the kids, for working families, over a 10 year period, the cuts would have been as much as 50%, would have been absolutely horrendous for the most vulnerable people in this country. And after a whole lot of negotiations between the White House and Republicans, what ended up happening, the Republican proposal did not go through. But what ended up happening is they reached the two year agreement which will modestly cut important programs, not huge cuts, modestly cut, two, three percent, which is not good because many of these programs are already underfunded. At the same time, it will increase military spending by 46 billion over a two year period and also approved a pipeline which will contribute to fossil fuel emissions, the equivalent of some 47 coal burning plants. Not exactly what we need right now. So I voted against it. I was in the minority in the Democratic caucus but I did vote against it. It passed and the good news obviously is not going to be an economic collapse. What are some of the other issues that are out there? The beginning of the process, some of my Republican colleagues wanted to cut Social Security and Medicare. And one of the ways they do it is precisely by dealing with this coal issue. You got an 8% increase and one way to simply do it is they're not going to give it as generous coal as. The other way to do it is to raise the retirement age above where it is right now. And there are other things that you could do to cut Social Security out. My own feeling is that a lot of the younger people get nervous about this. They think Social Security's not going to be there for them. So let me just tell you where we're at, where the problem is. The solvency, in a sense, the money in the bank that Social Security now has is going to be ended. It's got to come to an end in, I can't remember how many more years, not many more years. That's a problem that we have got to deal with. To my mind, there is a very simple solution, and I've introduced legislation to do it. All of you know that somebody who makes $10 million a year contributes the same amount into Social Security as somebody who makes $160,000. And that, to me, in so many ways, is grossly unfair. If you lift the cap and tax all income, the vast majority of the people will not be paying more than Social Security tax, overwhelming majority. But what we can do by bringing in money from people on top, the very wealthiest people, is we can extend the solvency of Social Security for 75 years. And, and, importantly, raise benefits by $2,400. So there are a lot of seniors out there who are trying to get by on $13,000, $14,000, $15,000 a year, and they can't, they're really struggling. Maybe we'll discuss that a little bit later. But we would lift the benefits for everybody by at least $2,400. That is the solution. And that's something we're gonna continue to fight for. There is another effort also to cut Medicare benefits, which I certainly may do everything I can to oppose it. Let me just give you my broad view and then we'll open it up great to some questions. I am not gonna lie to you and tell you the things that are going well in this country now. For a start, in America today, 60% of our people are living paycheck to paycheck. You'll know what that means. Paycheck to paycheck means at the end of the month, you got nothing to expect. Many of our older workers have nothing as they face retirement. But meanwhile, the economy is doing phenomenally well for the people on top. Never done that. So for those of you in this room, of which I do not see many, who are in the top 1%, the top 1% has literally never had it so many. And that means there is now more income and wealth inequality today than there has ever been in history in this country. So you got three people on top owning more wealth at the bottom, half of the American society. Now, for better or for worse, you are senators, one of the few people who talks about these issues. It's just not, we don't talk about it in the media for reasons. You don't talk about it in the halls of Congress, but income and wealth inequality. And what that means for the future of this country is a huge issue. I will talk about it. Because it is immoral to my mind that so few have so much and so many have so little. Now what we're gonna talk about, we'll talk about housing. There's not about seeing housing. But about nutrition programs, we have waiting lists of meals on wheels, correct? And et cetera. And that is a question of priorities of when you get tax breaks, the billionaires, where you fund the needs of seniors, children, we have the highest rate of childhood poverty amongst any major country. So my views are a little bit different than many others. Number two, you have a lot of in this country now concentration of ownership. You know what that means? That means you have a few Wall Street firms that have enormous impact on virtually every big business that you own. Number three, you have a media, corporate media. When you turn on TV, you think you're watching television that is owned by very, very wealthy people who choose to discuss certain things. Sometimes we do a great job who choose to ignore other issues. And fourthly, you all know this. We have a very corrupt campaign finance system. And what that means is literally right now that billionaires can contribute as much money as they want to the two in the hundreds of millions of dollars into what's called a superman. So you see on television, some committee for this, so the committee for that comes from billionaires who run 30 second ads for or against candidates they like or don't like. So you've got a handful, you know, the average American may contribute 25, 50 bucks to a candidate. But billionaires contribute hundreds of millions of dollars. And obviously then have a system that works for them, tax breaks for the rich, more money for military spending, more money for the fossil fuel industry, less money for seniors and children and working families. So that's kind of the overview of what's going on. And lastly, I would say we sort in Vermont. I was just, I came back from DC last night and I was walking around DC yesterday and it was horrible. You could literally, I probably walked from my house, which is about a 70 minute walk. I probably shouldn't have done it because I didn't feel all that great when I got into the office. The air was disgusting. You could literally smell the smoke. This is not coming from our neighbors in Quebec. We previously had a huge fire in Nova Scotia. I'm one in the West Coast in Alberta. And anyone who thinks that this is the worst is going to be a mistake. And the question is whether or not the Congress, and it's not only America, but the China, or the India, where the country's all over the world, wake up and say, you know what, we're gonna have to move aggressively to cut back significantly on fossil fuels with the sustainable energy. I'm doing what I can whether or not this is resolved. And I gotta tell you, I go into a lot of high schools in the state and kids are really, really worried about it for a good reason. This is their future. I'm wondering what happens. When they are worried, what kind of plan are they gonna be living in? And they really are deeply concerned about it. Okay, what's that, Greg? Why not cheerful though? Let's open it up to any questions? Well, I'll jump right back in here, Senator. Thank you so much. If you've just joined us, you're joining us. Live ARP from downtown Hall with Senator Bernie Sanders. We are live at the Montpelier Senior Center. And if you wanna ask Senator Sanders if he's hit star three on your telephone keypad, that's star three on your telephone keypad. And we'll get you in the queue so that you can have the senator a question. Senator, we're gonna go, I'm gonna go into the email question. It just came in to be a starter. And the question is, is that has there most adults want to remain in their own home or in a supportive living community as they grow older without having to move each time their needs increase? How will you help to address the housing crisis so that older adults may influence? Okay. Thanks for that very important question. And it's Greg just indicated and the question is indicated. The truth is, everything being equal when one can, one would rather stay in one's own home rather than go to another school. And that speaks to the need for a significant increase in people who do home healthcare. And we have a major, major crisis in that regard. Some of you may be familiar with the phrase build back better. That was an attempt that I helped lead as chairman of the budget committee at the time which would have poured hundreds of billions of dollars into home healthcare to raise the salaries of those workers who now get pathetically low wages and encourage more people to get the training, the education they need to be good home healthcare workers. But let me give it all to our panel. Do you have Nick or Kim, do you want to jump in on home healthcare and the options that people have? Sure, people in the state of Vermont are very fortunate because we have the choices for care system which allows for people to remain in their home and have services come into their home. We continue to see that build in the last 10 to 15 years where people originally were mostly in nursing homes to receive that level of care. And now we've passed the 60% mark or close to it of people who are remaining in the community with that kind of support. So if I would like to get home healthcare, who do I call? So I think home healthcare is in and of itself a separate entity because it's Medicare funded and Medicare has very strict rules about having people come into your home. But the programs in the state of Vermont are programs that can help people hire their own people or use home healthcare to purchase those services from. What are the agencies, what are the major agencies in the state of Vermont? So the area agencies on aging and the home health agencies all work together to help people get onto those programs through the state of Vermont. Kim, did you want to add anything to that or? Yeah, well, I'd add just two. So, and I mentioned before a little bit about SASH and we have a stands for support and service at home. It is mostly based in affordable housing but they become hubs to serve folks outside of the community around those publications. We're really at capacity. However, I would say SASHvermont.org if you want our interest in finding out if there's a location near you. The other thing I want to mention is home modification programs. I do know that AARP has done numerous surveys and has found that one of the barriers to being able to remain independent in your own home is modifications. Not even necessarily like ramps because that is part of it but even just cleaning out the gutters, doing snow removal in the winter, those types of things. And so there are, I know of two home modification programs so I want to make sure you're aware of those two, one is through the state and we are actually running one right now through a HUD grant, so a federal grant in Chittenden County and most of these towns in Chittenden County. So again, you can contact us if you're interested. All right, but what I would say is I think you will agree with me that one of the problems we have with home health care is we pay these workers who do very important work in on it with wages. We did a town meeting in Washington with people from all over the country. These are people who work through COVID, right? They went, they loved their patients, they are incredibly dedicated. They go out to home, some of them got COVID and they're making 13, 14, 15 bucks a month. So we're trying to increase the salaries. Nevada just raised their wages to 16 bucks an hour, home health care workers. We've got to do that all over the country. So it's such an important work. People want to stay home to what good quality care or want somebody who knows what they're doing. And that's an area that will work on in Washington. Senator, Senator, I would also add. Thank you. I would just add that that's awesome. Our queue started to fill up here, so we want to make sure we get as many classes as we can. Go right ahead. Sorry to interrupt. No, that's okay. Thank you. If you've just joined us, you're live with A.R.P. from our Senator Bernie Sanders. Well, I tell him on town hall meeting, if you'd like to ask Senator a question, just press star three on your telephone keypad, star three on your telephone keypad, we'll get you in the queue then, Senator Creston. Senator, we're going to go to, we're going to go to Beth. Beth, what's your question for the Senator? Well, my concern is about the privateization of Medicare through these Medicare Advantage plans, which I think many seniors don't realize that Medicare Advantage really is not part of Medicare. It's a private insurance company. Is there any way of a bill or something to at least have that being formed that people realize what a Medicare Advantage plan is and what you see and what can be done about the future of Medicare? Thank you for that very important question. Look, what I'm going to again be, I'm going to be political here again. When Medicare was first developed under Lyndon Johnson in 65, I think it was, it was the type of being socialism, Medicaid was socialism, terrible, terrible, terrible. Turns out that Medicare itself is the most popular healthcare program in the United States. But the private insurance companies who have, as the caller indicated, enormous wealth, enormous power. They want to privatize Medicare and they're moving to Medicare Advantage. And they confuse people. I've been around the country, not in Vermont, but around the country where there are billboards that says I think United Medicare. They're making people think that Medicare Advantage is Medicare, it is not. They make a lot of money off of that. And what they do is they make a lot of money in administration, they charge higher fees, they pay lower benefits to doctors in some cases. Now what they do, one of their selling points is they provide a dental, vision and hearing care. Which is enormously important. And I tried in this Build Back Better Build. We tried desperately, I have Medicare include dental, vision and hearing as part of Medicare. It is, it is basic healthcare. Right many seekers need hearing aids, can't afford them. Dental care is outrageously expensive, true? All right. And what Medicare Advantage does often advertises they do these things. But if you check the bottom line, it's not quite what they advertise. So to answer your question, this is an attempt by the powerful insurance industry to take over and privatize Medicare. It is something we are aware of, I talked to the president about it, and it's something we will fight back on. Thank you very much, that's a good call. Thank you, Senator. Again, if you'd like to ask Senator a very sensitive question this afternoon, you're welcome. Because it starts three on your telephone keypad, we're gonna get you in the queue. Senator, let's go to the first live question from the audience today here at Montpelier Senior Center. Let's have a question for the audience. Yeah. Hi, I'm the note, Jody Feddersen from Montpelier. On the note about Medicare, what's happened about that other program where they were actually giving Medicare clients to the insurance companies and they didn't even know that they were part of it? I think it was called REACH? Yeah. You guys don't know anything about it? You don't know anything about it? I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with it. I apologize. Could you look into it? Yeah, we could. Thank you. But again, in general, what you have right now is corporate interests who want to privatize Social Security, who want to privatize Medicare in Medicaid, public education, the Postal Service, any public entity that is out there that is non-profit, you know, we've got to improve these institutions. I'm not saying they run perfectly, but they want to move toward the privatization of them. REACH, should we take another question here, or do you want to go to the phones? We're going to go to the phones, and we're going to go to James. So, James, what's your question today for Senator Sanders? I had two questions. The first question is, I haven't heard anything about it, but the other question is, I haven't heard anything about the college loan program and the recourse for the younger kids who just got out of college running, and they're still expected to pay back that. I mean, it's been put on hold, but they're payback methods, but are they going to do anything for them or not? Is it stuck in the Supreme Court case or something, or I just would like to know what's going on there? And my second question is, is there a reprieve for people who are out of the liberal and legal areas? And I got dragged by the rail company because they couldn't see the fleet coming out towards my furnace. And so they won't deliver any more oil, so I have to put them in a new line, a box that connects to the oil, to the furnace, and that shows the thing all the way. I was wondering why people are afraid about it. I don't know the answer to your second question, I do know the answer to your first. We have a situation in this country, it was a huge debate going on. In my view, we have a younger generation, people who've gone through college who are in really bad financial situation in many cases. Many of them are carrying, 45 million people of student debt. It's impacting on their ability to buy a home, to buy a car, even to have children. Biden came up with last year, a student debt relief package, which didn't go as far as I would like, but it was pretty good. Republicans went running to the Supreme Court to get it overturned. We will hear from the courts in short order on that. I'm not quite sure how the courts will rule. If they rule against the plan, there will be another plan to come forward to address the court's concerns that would continue to cancel large amounts of student debt. So that's kind of where we are there. Thank you Senator. Okay. Yeah, I just wanted to remind folks to hit start free on their telephone keypad if they want to have Senator Sanders' question to start. And we'll go to one more on the phone and then we'll go back to the live audience. Let's go to Lester in Coventry. Lester, what's your question for Senator Sanders, Senator? Good afternoon, Senator. I'll let that chill and not follow that now, but I would like to know is why you voted against it when you knew what the ramifications were going to be, and especially with people that were going to get Social Security checks. Okay, thank you. Thank you for the question. I discussed it a little bit earlier. I'll repeat it briefly. I voted against it because at a time of massive income and wealth inequality, it will cut programming for seniors, for kids, for working families. That's number one. On number two, while it cuts programs for working families and most vulnerable people, it increases military spending by $46 billion over a two-year period. And thirdly, it had in it the completion in a very convoluted way of a pipeline that will be the equivalent of some 47 coal-burning plants. It was my belief from day one that the president had another option, and that is to use the 14th amendment of the Constitution to pay the debt. So if the point is, shouldn't we pay our debt? And if you don't, would it be catastrophic? The answer is yes, we must pay our debts. There are other ways to do that rather than coming down on people who already heard it. So that's why I voted against it. Thank you, Senator Sanders. For those of you just joining us today, our P-5 Telephone Town Hall with Senator Bird of Sanders today, and AARP Vermont Live from the Montpelier Senior Activity Center. You'd like to have Senator Sanders elected to start reading on your telephone keypad, start reading, and we'll get you into queue so you can have Senator Sanders weapons this afternoon. Let's go to the online audience for the next question. Okay, yeah. Hi, Senator, I admire you greatly. You're an anomaly, I think, in our federal government. And I see very little hope for the future because greed trumps everything. And how will it ever change? Talked about the voting mess and the election craziness. So a lot of people just feel like there's no hope. I don't want people to feel that there is no hope. These are, as I began chatting with you before we went on the essence, these are difficult times. But again, it's important, and I really do agree with you. What we all, you know, greed is not a new phenomenon, right? Violence dealt with the people dealing with it forever. What you're seeing now, I think, is what I would call oomph of greed. A level of greed that we have never seen before. You know, everybody wants to make money. You want to make money? I want to marry someone so I have a comfortable life. Nothing new about that. Business guys always try to make as much profit as they could, nothing new about that. But you're seeing something today that I have never seen. That has never been the case before. And that is people who have so much wealth. Again, three people in America owning more wealth than about half of American society. Top 1% getting something like 45% of all new income. And you know what? They want more and more. These guys own yachts that are worth hundreds of millions of dollars. They got their own planes. They don't vacation in the state park. They buy their own islands. Their kids don't go to the local daycare center. You know, they have nannies and all this stuff. They own dozens of houses all over the world. It really is obscene, the kind of greed that we are seeing. And then they use that wealth that they have to increase what they want. So then they go to Congress, they have all kinds of libraries, the drug companies. They make tens of billions of dollars in profit every year. And they have 1,800 paid lobbyists in Washington DC, 1,800 former leaders of the Democratic Party, Republican Party telling us why we can't lower the cost of prescription drugs, which is the highest in the world. So it is really quite uncontrollable. And we've got to change the culture of this country. You know? No one objects to people making money and becoming rich. But enough really is enough. You know, and one of the points that it's not often made, you know, we've gone through a strong inflation period, right? A lot of people are hurt by that. And people will say, well, it's because of the war in Ukraine. It's because of the breakdown of supply chain. And that is a contributing factor. But do you know what the major factor was? It was corporate greed. You paid more at the gas pump, the gas guess what ExxonMobil made last year. Huge profits. Paid more at the grocery store for your food. Check out what the major food companies paid huge profits. And they took advantage of the confusion to raise prices outrageously. And they give their CEOs, you know, millions of dollars in compensation. So your point is right. That is the major concern that I have is that it's the uncontrollable greed of these people who want it all. And I think we've got to figure out a way to stop them. OK, great. Thank you for your change. And if you can, if you're just going to live at your telephone cell hall with our very own Senator Bernie Sanders, you'd like to have a Senator question, hit start three on your telephone keypad. Start three on your telephone keypad, and I'll get you the cue. Senator, I have a question that came in through email that I'd love to ask you from one of our members that says, are senior centers and meals on meals programs are critical to many vulnerable Brahmans living in isolation? Who rely on these programs to prove that these programs continue to be drastically underfunded? How can you and others in the federal government better support these programs for our rural communities? Well, actually, you're talking to the right guy about that issue, because I'm the chairman of the committee that oversees the Older American Act. And the questioner is absolutely right. I think our panelists, Megan and Kim and Annie, we have more people who want nutrition programs. Do you want to say a word on that, Megan? Sure, it continues to be a really complex issue. And we have more and more people wanting home delivered meals. We want, we have people who are trying to make it on their own and live on a low income and be able to afford food. And as you talked about, the food price is going up. So our networks of food pantries and work with the food bank really becomes critical as our way to help people get their needs met. Kim, do you want to add anything? Yeah, I would echo what Megan's saying about food pantries. I think one thing not a lot of people know is one, you can have a proxy shopper. So if you have a community of folks that are willing to help you out, that's an option. And just taking a look at the availability of fresh produce in food pantries now, it's a lot more nutritious foods that are being offered there. All right, but the answer to the question, it is a question of our national priorities. Don't ask me why I voted against it, but the debt ceiling bill. Is debt ceiling bills going to cut any of these programs? I'm chairman of the committee and you have my word that I am going to do everything that I can to greatly expand these programs. Because I'll tell you why. It's not only a question of nutrition for the congregate meal programs. You have a Convert Meal Program probably right here. And the Meals on Wheels program, this is what it also does. It's also provides the socialization that many people need. Many people living alone, they're isolated. You come to have lunch with your friends, you have a good time, you get involved in other activities, this very good senior center has. And Meals on Wheels, I'll tell you about Meals on Wheels. Meals on Wheels are by definition people who are isolated, unable to get out of the house. And when somebody knocks on the door, it's not only bringing a good meal, it is seeing how they're doing. It may be the only live person somebody's talking to all day. We are working on a whole bunch of stuff on the committee. One of the issues touches this one. If you can believe it, this is how crazy the system is. If you're on Medicaid, for example, and you have a serious illness and you need surgery, you go to the hospital and Medicaid will spend tens of thousands of dollars on the surgery, okay? Good. You have a successful surgery and they say, okay, you're getting out of the hospital on Monday and you're going home. Guess what? You may be going home to a house which is cold. You may be going home to a house where you have inadequate food. You may be going home to a house where you don't know how to figure out how to take the medicines, the five different medicines that they just gave you, all right? And lo and behold, shock of all shocks, a significant number of the people who leave the hospital get readmitted to the hospital at huge expense that the healthcare system. Brilliant, right? So what we're trying to do is develop an increased legislation that says when you leave the hospital, we will make sure there is somebody taking care of you, making sure you're taking meds, your home is warm, you're eating, and you end up saving money by doing that because people don't end up back in the hospital. So those are all the important things that meals on wheels and congregate meal programs do. And we're gonna do our best as chairman of the committee to increase funding for them. Thank you, Senator. One of our members that's watching the program live on our Facebook feed has sent in a question as well and says this, I have a 22-year-old special needs son to attend Hamilton University's college steps program. I drive 400 miles a week during the school year to take him to class. There's no transportation service that matches the cloud of diesel at all, and I live in Bennington. What can be done? What can be done is to have a rational rural healthcare system in America, which we surely don't have, but can we beg or anyone wanna say we're gonna work on transportation? That's an issue, isn't it? Yeah, that's what I was gonna say. It's just a huge issue, and especially in rural parts of the state. I mean, even in the more urban parts of the state, honestly, it's really not the greatest, and we need to expand it. Again, all of these things come down to priorities and whether the government starts paying attention to the needs of ordinary people, whether they're elderly, whether they're children, whether they're sick. We are the only country, and I keep saying this over and over again, because too few people say it. You are living in the only major country on earth which happens to be the wealthiest country on earth that does not guarantee healthcare to all people as a human right. All right? Now, that idea of taking on the insurance companies and passing a Medicare flow is too radical for most people in Congress. We've introduced the legislation. Good news in the House, there's over 100 sponsors, but in the Senate, we only have 14. But at the end of the day, a lot of the issues that we talk about could be addressed by doing what our friends in Canada do. You walk in, anyone know here if you are serious surgery in Canada? And it's true in Europe as well, and you spend two weeks in the hospital. What's the bill when you get out? Anybody here know? Nothing. Do you know how much Canada spends per capita on healthcare compared to the United States? Half. They spend half as much and they cover all of their people with good quality care. No one argues that the care in Canada in general is not as good as it is in the United States. We spend twice as much. You got 85 million people uninsured and underinsured who pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. Can we deal with that reality? Probably not. The insurance companies and drug companies are enormously powerful, getting back to Europe and they're incredibly greedy. But that is what we have to do. We have to rally the American people to stand up. Because this is an issue, by the way. It is not a democratic issue. This state is fairly progressive. It is not a conservative issue. I have seen polling where Republicans, just polling Republicans, you know what the major issues that they are concerned about? The high cost of prescription drugs, sound familiar? Everybody in America is concerned about that. So it's not a political issue. It's a question of whether we bring our people together to take on these very powerful special interests whose greed is really outrageous. Okay, Greg, go ahead. Yeah, we'll go back to the phone center. But again, if you'd like to ask a question, go to star three on your telephone keypad, star three from your keypad, and we'll get you to queued up on your center's request today. Senator, we're gonna go to Paula and Derby. Paula, what's your request today for center centers? My husband recently passed and I'm collecting his social security. I'm still able to work, and I want to work, but social security will penalize me if I work so many hours. And I find that I need to work not only to make it meet, but it's mentally therapy for me. It keeps me from grieving so much. I don't understand why, if someone is healthy to work, why social security would penalize them? Paula, I agree with you. And for the reasons that you gave, you're entitled to the social security benefits that your husband worked for. And if you choose for your own personal reasons, it makes you feel better and cause you need the income to go out and work, you should not be penalized on that. And that is one of the many issues regarding social security that we want to address. Thanks for the question. Thank you, Senator. Let's go to one of the questions in the live audience today, with some audience questions. Go ahead, please. So the issue with the pharmaceutical companies absolutely is the cost of medication, but there's another issue, which is, and this doesn't actually only happen in this country, it also happens in Canada, but not to the same extent, where they force you to take medications that actually cause cops or are not efficacious. And the medical providers are absolutely at the behest of these pharmaceutical companies. All right, excellent question. What you're talking about is an issue called prior authorization, which is an issue we are working on by staff in Washington is listening to this program. They shouldn't be because they're working on this issue right now. And that is one of the things I talked to actually a Republican doctor in Congress. Probably right. And he said, Bernie, the system is broken. And many doctors are becoming very demoralized. They want to treat you. That's what they went to medical school. That was the apocratic oath it's about. And then they have to argue with the insurance companies about the kind of treatment they want to provide for you. And in this particular doctor, you know what he said? He said, I would tell the other people, not even to go into the medical profession, that it is so demoralizing right now. So thank you for that question. We are working right now as we speak. And this bill will probably come up within the month. One of the sections will be on prior authorization. And you talk to almost any doctor and they'll tell you how to demoralize it. And it's expensive. You go to UVM hospital, there are 40 or 50 people whose sole job is to argue with insurance companies. And that costs a lot of money, millions of dollars just for UVM. So thank you for the question. You know, our job is like, doctors are not perfect, they're gonna make mistakes. But they're the ones who went to medical school. They're the ones who are entrusted to take care of us. I trust them a lot more than I do the insurance companies. Okay, great. Thank you, Senator. But yeah, we're gonna go to Bob in Plainfield. Bob, what's the quest today for Senator Sanders? Hi, Senator. This is Bob Adger from Plainfield. We go back a few years here. I'm an energy coordinator out here in Plainfield. And I am just distressed over our climate emergency. We keep seeing last year, 15 million people in Pakistan were flooded out. Now we've got the air that we can't breathe here. And we have a president who seems to be more intent on granting oil leases and new things to drill for in our extracted economy while the fossil fuel companies continue on their death project. I don't know how to move things or wake people up to the fact, but it's coming down to the point where people are gonna have to be in the streets to get the administration to wake up. Maybe you have a creative idea on how to do that, but I'm in a lot. Well, Bob, thank you, Bob, and thank you for your work. And you were talking about an issue which I hope every sane person understands. And that is what we have seen, what we're seeing right now as we speak a few miles away from us in Canada. And what we have seen in the West Coast, in terms of the terrible forest fires in Oregon and California, what we have seen in the heat waves in Europe, the extreme weather disturbances that have destroyed communities in the United States. But Bob is saying, this is not gonna get back. You know, there's a mentality out there, it's, oh, this is really terrible, but it's not gonna happen again. It will happen again. This is not Bernie Sanders who failed physics in college. This is the best scientist in the world who are telling us that as the planet heats up, these are the things, the ocean is warming with huge ramifications. In Vermont, in April, just a couple of months ago, the temperature was four degrees higher than average. Four degrees, that's huge, right? And we've had some of the hottest days, you know? I can't remember, 30, 40 years ago, we had winter storms below zero. Remember that? For weeks, that does not happen anymore. So this, you know, these are patterns that's supposed to take thousands of years with a single in our eyes. So Bob is right, we are facing not only an American catastrophe, but a world catastrophe. And we have got to bring China and every other country on earth together to deal with this, because every country is gonna be dealing with floods and drought impacts weather, it impacts food production. So Bob is quite right. Then one of the reasons Bob that I voted, as I mentioned several times this afternoon, I guess the death ceiling, it fast-fracted a pipeline that would be the equivalent of 27 cold burning plant submissions. So thank you, Bob. Keep up the work and keep the faith. This is an issue we've got to address. Greg? Thanks, Senator. Again, this is the AARP Telephone Town Hall with Senator Bernie Sanders. You'd like to ask the Senator a question? Does it start at three on your telephone P-pad? Senator, let's start with another audience, live audience question. Go ahead, please. Okay. I think it's a gentleman in the back there. Yeah. I have a question about your recent vote about the death ceiling and whatnot. I understand it must have been quite difficult for you to decide how to vote. Very controversial because it would result in bad things whichever way you voted. But if you had not voted or became majority, what about? The question is whether I voted to let the country default, I would not. You know, I understand that, but I mean, the other thing was that we could. All right. Let's go to Jules and Sparks. Jules, what's your question today, Senator Sanders? I'll talk to you later. Jules? Yeah, hello. Yeah, go ahead, Senator, just wait for your question. Right, thank you, Senator Sanders, for taking care of my husband who was sick for 25 years, who was a veteran, and he thought that he got from his house. My question is, we as seniors work hard to be able to and put money aside to make a long-term care insurance. And I'd like to know why we can't have that as tax break on that, that would help us out. I think you are absolutely right. I think it makes a lot of sense to me. So let me think about how we do it, but I think that is quite right. And by the way, I'm glad we were able to help your husband on a veteran's insurance. I want to mention to all of those people on the phone, people here, we have five or six case workers who are really, really excellent. They deal with the federal agencies every day. And one of the things we spend a lot of time on are veterans issues, Medicare, social security issues. The office number is 1-800-339-9834. So if you have any issues that you think we could help you with on any issue, any concern, please don't hesitate to give us a ring. Okay, Greg? Yeah, Senator, we're gonna go to another Facebook question that's come into us today. And it says most adults want to, wait, that was the one from before, the other one here, here we go. As a result of the COVID pandemic, in several adult daycare centers in my community, a nursing home shut down in rural areas. This is a funding and a workforce issue. So we want to know what some of the policies are that you're exploring to ensure that we have these critical safety nets, particularly in rural parts of our state. Well, I mean, it gets back to our priorities and what we invested. COVID had a obviously huge impact on schools, childcare centers, senior centers, senior care centers. Hopefully we were recovering from that. One of the problems that we have is that many of the people who do that work whether they're dealing with seniors at home healthcare and the disabled, whether they're dealing with children in childcare work, the childcare centers make horrific, horrific salaries. We're talking about 13, 14 bucks an hour, 15 bucks an hour, doing very difficult work. So we are trying, and again, we're running up against opposition from people who would like to cut these programs even more. So obviously we want to put money into home healthcare and to senior care and to make sure that we have well-paid people who are doing the work. Yes. I just want to add to that, currently the state it goes through does have a 79% increase for the Medicaid reimbursement rate at a long-term care communities to help with exactly this issue to be able to pay a better rate. But it doesn't help with the second shortages. Clearly we're experiencing that across the state. The higher rate should be making it more attractive for people to come in. Yes, there was a rate study that showed we were getting pennies on the dollar and so instead of $47 a day, we'd be out beginning over $80 a day. Okay, well that's good to hear. Okay, great. Thanks, Madam. We're gonna go to Judith at East Darsen. Here to put your questions for Senator Sanders today. Hello, thank you for taking the call. I have a question about the children and their safety in the schools. And is it our greed that has kept us from facing that problem and standing up to gun control? I cannot bear to be 88 years old and know my grandchildren are in danger every day as they go to school. Well, thank you for that. Thank you very much. Thank you for that question, Judith. You know, this is an issue that I almost find it difficult to talk about because it is so horrific and so unspeakable to imagine that people would do what we are seeing time and time again. Just two days ago, as a matter of, what's that, it's right, Thursday morning. I was in DC and there were a group of young people, not young people, but people all across the country camping out, trying to lobby Congress on the issue of banning automatic weapons, which I supported. And they gave me, I think each other people there was related to a childhood and killed either in school or in a war or elsewhere. And you know, it is just horrific to be looking at these pictures of beautiful young kids who are no longer with us. So to answer your question, you're quite right. What you got is both for economic reasons and greed, but for political reasons as well, and for folks who stand with the NRA, who will do everything they can to make sure that we don't have what the American people overwhelmingly want is strong gun safety legislation. Now people disagree on this or that aspect of it, but there is no question that the American people want a lot, lot more in terms of background checks, in terms of banning automatic weapons than what we have been able to do. We're making a tiny bit of progress, but no near enough. And it comes back to political power in Washington, some politicians dependency on groups like the National Rightful Association. Rick. Thank you, Senator. We're gonna take, we have time for one final audience question this afternoon, so let's go ahead and take that. All right, yeah, you got it. Okay, sir. Senator, a few moments ago you, I am one of your supporters, by the way. A few moments ago you mentioned this Elvis question regarding the tendency of the Republican minority to threaten the well-being of the country, holding in kind of a rink and shit manner holders trying to get their own political agenda put forward, but doesn't your willingness to vote that way on that bill put you in exactly the same position? No, because I wouldn't if the question was what the United States would default or not, I would not have voted to default. But on the other hand, it is important for people to stand up and say there was an alternative. If you keep voting for the lesser of two evils, you will always get an evil. It was important. We wrote to the president, we had a press conference with a number of senators, including Senator Welch, who said, use the 14th amendment. Stand up to these people. There is an alternative other than approving a pipeline that we don't need and cutting programs for low income and working people. So in my view, it was important to stand up and say that there was an alternative. That's my view. Okay, Greg, back to you. I just want to say that we are running up against our time here. I want to thank you so much for joining us today. And as always, I want to give you an opportunity for closing remarks. So if you go ahead and close out the forum, we appreciate it. Okay, well, let me thank Greg Marshallden and AARP, Vermont AARP and the Montpelio Senior Center for hosting us and our three panelists here as well. Look, these are difficult times for the country. But the worst thing that we could do is to throw up our hands in despair and give up. You may have differences, but I want everybody to be engaged in the political process, to respect other people's points of view, to argue without, to learn, to make sure that kids know what a democracy is about. Because one of the things that I worry about on the top of everything else that we've talked about is whether or not this country actually remains a democracy in years to come. So democracy means we can have differences of opinion. That's fine, not any issue. That's called democracy. But we have to fight to defend that and to educate our kids about what our constitution and the democratic process is about. So let me thank AARP and the Senior Center here at Montpelio for hosting this and look forward to coming back and then I'll do this in the future. Thank you all very much. Thank you very much, Andrew. Thank you very much. I'm Aaron, but it's an easy-to-get-not.