WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Nation endorsed Bernie Sanders for president — its third endorsement in 150 years.
The storied left-wing magazine on Thursday cited the Vermont Independent senator’s record in opposing “inequality, both economic and political.” It had offered previous endorsements of the Rev. Jesse Jackson in 1988 and Barack Obama in 2008.
“America’s middle class has melted away, while the gap between rich and poor has reached Gilded Age extremes,” the editorial said.
The magazine’s editors said they wished Sanders would expound more on foreign policy, but added they liked what they heard.
“An opponent of the Iraq War from the start, he criticizes the notion of ‘regime change’ and the presumption that America alone must police the world. He rejects a new Cold War with Russia,” the editorial said. “He supports the nuclear-weapons agreement with Iran, and he would devote new energy to dismantling nuclear arsenals and pursuing nonproliferation.”
The weekly journal said Sanders’ main opponent in the Democratic primaries, front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton, was preferable to any of the Republicans in the race and praised her “intelligence, grit and strength,” but said she tends too much toward compromise with Republicans.
Notably, The Nation, which has featured anti-Zionists prominently on its pages as well as some pro-Israel voices, did not cite Sanders’ posture on Israel.
Sanders, who is Jewish and lived in Israel for a period in the 1960s, has been critical of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians but has also adamantly defended Israel’s right to exist.
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