--- title: Bernie Sanders Charts New Course on Middle-Class Taxes description: Sanders said on Sunday he would not raise taxes on the middle class for any reason except to pay for paid family leave. canonical: https://time.com/4156619/bernie-sanders-middle-class-tax-pledge/ author: Sam Frizell article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-12-21T17:33:02.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:41:53.531Z article:section: Politics og:title: Why Bernie Sanders' Tax Pledge Matters og:description: It complicates his domestic agenda. og:url: https://time.com/4156619/bernie-sanders-middle-class-tax-pledge/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt25d3b8e2ac78af61/69887656cf40a83f34c412ea/bernie-sanders-middle-class-taxes.jpg?branch=production&width=594&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 594 og:image:height: 334 og:image:alt: ABC News coverage of the Democratic Presidential debate from St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH, airing Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015 on the ABC Television Network and all ABC News platforms. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why Bernie Sanders' Tax Pledge Matters twitter:description: It complicates his domestic agenda. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt25d3b8e2ac78af61/69887656cf40a83f34c412ea/bernie-sanders-middle-class-taxes.jpg?branch=production&width=594&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Why Bernie Sanders' Tax Pledge Matters > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=5796fd19-a53d-4ffa-8df6-6a0b4e5cb52c&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Five Things to Know About Bernie Sanders [Watch (HLS stream): Five Things to Know About Bernie Sanders](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/DG42CHjd.m3u8) (1:15)  _Published 2015-09-15. Five Things to Know About Bernie Sanders_ by [Sam Frizell](https://time.com/author/sam-frizell/) ## Sam Frizell Dec 21, 2015 5:33 PM UTC  ABC News coverage of the Democratic Presidential debate from St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH, airing Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015 on the ABC Television Network and all ABC News platforms. ABC News coverage of the Democratic Presidential debate from St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH, airing Saturday, Dec. 19, 2015 on the ABC Television Network and all ABC News platforms. Ida Mae Astute—ABC via Getty Images by [Sam Frizell](https://time.com/author/sam-frizell/) ## Sam Frizell Dec 21, 2015 5:33 PM UTC For years, Bernie Sanders has supported broad middle-class tax hikes to pay for the ambitious government program at the heart of his progressive agenda: his proposed Medicare-for-all program, in the style of Canada and European systems. But now, the Vermont Senator appears to be charting a different course. Sanders, who is fighting an uphill battle to appeal to a wider base in the Democratic primary, said on Sunday he would not raise taxes on the middle class for any reason except to pay for paid family leave. Sanders’ commitment to not raise taxes, made on NBC’s _Meet the Press_, is a departure from the rhetoric earlier in his campaign. It also comes close to matching Hillary Clinton’s pledge not to raise taxes on the middle class, which the campaign has previously criticized. NBC’s Chuck Todd asked Sanders on Sunday morning if paid family leave was the only measure Sanders would raise taxes for. “Is that the only thing you plan on raising taxes on the middle class on?” Todd said. “Yes, that’s right,” Sanders said. “Look, we have seen a huge transfer of wealth from the middle-class to the top one-tenth of 1%.” **Read More:** [_Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders Spar on Middle Class Taxes_](http://time.com/4156206/democratic-debate-hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-taxes/) Aides to Sanders deny that his position is a reversal, saying that Sanders’ Medicare-for-all program, which in the 2013 Senate version includes a 2.2% income tax increase for the middle class, never counted as a tax hike because it would ultimately save families money. And they say to Sanders say he will still be able to pay for big-ticket items like Medicare-for-all, tuition-free public college, infrastructure programs and others, by taxing the wealthy. But Sanders’ statement backs away from the previous months of his campaign, and leaves him open to criticism from economists who frown on across-the-board pledges like it and liberals who worry it could constrain a progressive agenda. Hillary Clinton, who is leading Sanders in polls for the Democratic nomination, has already promised not to raise taxes on families earning under $250,000 a year. She and her aides have slammed Sanders for not making the same pledge. In the debate on Saturday night, Sanders lashed back with a defense of certain taxes increases. ‘When Secretary Clinton says, ‘I’m not going raise taxes on the middle class,’ let me tell you what she is saying,” Sanders said. “She is disagreeing with FDR on Social Security, LBJ on Medicare and with the vast majority of progressive Democrats in the House and the Senate, who today are fighting to end the disgrace of the United States being the only major country on Earth that doesn’t provide paid family and medical leave.” Speaking with TIME in November, campaign manager Jeff Weaver called Clinton’s no-tax pledge and proposed tax credits a “Republican approach.” **Read More:** [_Hillary Clinton’s Middle Class Tax Pledge Divides Democrats_](http://time.com/4126685/hillary-clinton-middle-class-tax-pledge/) “Why \[do\] you have a candidate who claims to be a progressive that is essentially laying out an approach to problems that is a Republican approach?” Weaver said of Clinton. “It’s an instinctive move back to the corporate centrism that the Democratic rank and file has disavowed.” And Sanders has long favored a middle-class income tax hike to pay for his most ambitious program, Medicare-for-all, which he introduced as a bill in the Senate in 2013\. The plan, which his campaign has been touting for months, was to be paid for by a 2.2% tax increase, as well as a 6.7% tax on wages paid by employers that Clinton aides say would results in a total 9% tax increase, because employers pass taxes on to their workers in the form of wage cuts. Aides say that Sanders’ Medicare-for-all can be paid for without the 2.2% tax increase on employees. His policy team is working out a new plan. “We are still developing a Medicare-for-all plan,” said Sanders senior policy advisor Warren Gunnels. “This plan will save middle class families thousands of dollars a year because they will no longer be paying premiums or deductibles to private health insurance companies.” In the past, Sanders has also called for closing corporate tax loopholes, raising the estate tax and taxing Wall Street regulation to pay for some of more ambitious initiatives. **Read Next:** [_Bernie Sanders Declares War on Democratic National Committee_](http://time.com/4155942/bernie-sanders-voter-data-breach-lawsuit/) ## Transcript This Capitol. This beautiful Capitol. Our country belonged to all of us and not the billionaire class. That's not raising an issue. That's winning elections. That's where the American people are. [ MUSIC ] Then leaving this country. Country and our entire planet. [ MUSIC ] We cannot bring about the change that we need unless millions of people are actively involved in the political process. [ MUSIC ] [ APPLAUSE ] [ MUSIC ] [ APPLAUSE ] To ask the president to stop the bombing immediately. And request that the secretary general of the United Nations, go to Iraq to begin immediate negotiations. 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