We reached five million donations...

[RobertDevereaux]

From today's Bernie email:

%%%%
Today, I am very proud to share with you some extraordinary news: our campaign has received more than 5 million individual contributions — that is more contributions than any campaign has received at this point in a presidential election in the history of our country.

Now I want to say a few words about why this accomplishment is so extraordinary.

For far too long, the economic and political systems have been stacked against ordinary Americans. The rich get richer because they use their wealth to buy our candidates and our elections. Meanwhile, more and more working people become demoralized and choose not to participate in the political process.

What we are proving on this campaign is that one does not need to beg the wealthy and the powerful for campaign contributions in order to win elections.

We are proving that when you run a campaign that speaks directly to the needs of working people and young people, they are ready to fight with you.

We are proving that we — US — are far more powerful than the 1 percent have ever imagined.

And that is important.

Because change never happens from the top down. It always happens from the bottom up. And now is the time, more than ever before, for millions of working families — black and white, Latino, Asian and Native American, gay and straight — to come together to end the collapse of the American middle class and to make certain that our children and grandchildren are able to enjoy a quality of life and a habitable planet that brings them health, prosperity, security and joy.

That kind of campaign is also the only kind of campaign that will win in November.

Now I am proud to say that ours is the only campaign in this Democratic primary with more donations than Donald Trump.

And that is important for two reasons:

First, practically, our campaign has raised more money than any other campaign in this race and will raise more money than any campaign would against Donald Trump.

We have 5 million individual donations in a Democratic primary that hasn’t even cast its first vote yet.

Against Trump, I believe we will have 50 million individual contributions, at least. And at $27 a piece, that would be more than $1 billion. It’s absolutely obscene and outrageous that an election would cost that much money, but our campaign has proven we will be able to raise more than enough money to win.

And our donation number is important for another reason: because in order to beat Trump, we’re going to need the largest voter turnout in the history of America.

And you don’t have the largest voter turnout unless you create energy and excitement.

And you don’t create energy and excitement unless you are prepared to take on the people who own America — not just beg them for money.

We need a progressive agenda that mobilizes millions and millions of Americans behind ideas like Medicare for all, raising the minimum wage, leading the world in combating climate change and more.

Now, you know that poll after poll shows we beat Trump by wide margins.

And when you combine that with the kind of grassroots enthusiasm our campaign has demonstrated the ability to generate, we will not only win this election, but we will have the organization ready to fight to transform this country.

You may remember that when I said I was going to run for president, I said that it would take a political revolution to win.

A lot of people thought that was an acknowledgment of impossibility. It wasn’t.

It was a statement of what would be necessary to undo the damage that has been done to our country and reclaim our country from the oligarchs.

Now, speaking this way about the need to take on the insurance companies, the drug companies, the fossil fuel companies, the military industrial complex, the prison industrial complex and virtually the entire damn one percent tends to make wealthy folks nervous.

That is fine.

They will see our numbers and will no doubt ratchet up their attacks.

But I have no doubt we will be ready.

And that we will win.

In solidarity,

Bernie Sanders
%%%%