Biden courts Sanders voters with student loan, healthcare policies
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[April 10, 2020]
By Trevor Hunnicutt
(Reuters) - Democratic presidential
candidate Joe Biden on Thursday proposed expanding access to Medicare
and forgiving some student debt in new overtures to supporters of
onetime rival Bernie Sanders.
Biden, who became Democrats' presumptive nominee when Sanders ended his
campaign on Wednesday, is working to close ranks as his party prepares a
campaign to unseat Republican President Donald Trump in the Nov. 3
election.
Biden's new proposals include expanding Medicare, government insurance
for Americans over 65, to those 60 and older. He also promises to
forgive student debt for lower-income Americans who attended public
colleges and some other educational institutions.
"Senator Sanders and his supporters can take pride in their work in
laying the groundwork for these ideas, and I'm proud to adopt them as
part of my campaign at this critical moment in responding to the
coronavirus crisis," Biden said in a statement.
Democratic presidential candidates battled for nearly a year about the
practicality of Sanders' plans to forgive all federal student debt and
his Medicare for All proposal providing health insurance to all
Americans. Biden opposed both, offering his own slate of education and
healthcare policies.
Now, Democrats are trying to tailor a message that can attract both the
left flank of their own party and more conservative voters who backed
Trump.
As his lead in the Democratic primaries grew, Biden pivoted to a message
of unity and started to adopt some policies his rivals endorsed. Sanders
on Wednesday called Biden "a very decent man, who I will work with to
move our progressive ideas forward."
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Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe
Biden speaks about responses to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic at
an event in Wilmington, Delaware, U.S., March 12, 2020.
REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo
Maurice Mitchell, national director at the Working Families Party, a
political group that endorsed Sanders, said Biden was taking "steps
in the right direction." Still, Mitchell said the coronavirus crisis
was making clear a need for broader debt relief and healthcare for
all.
"He's going to have to go some steps further especially in this
particular moment when there's a crisis at a scale many of us have
not experienced," he said.
On Thursday, Biden said his new policies would help Americans hurt
by the outbreak to "find more secure footing in the long term once
we have emerged from this crisis."
Biden is unlikely to broadly adopt Sanders' signature programs like
Medicare for All, according to people familiar with his plans.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt in New York; editing by Jonathan
Oatis and Cynthia Osterman)
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