--- title: 5 Things to Know About Bernie Sanders description: What you need to know about the Democratic Party's dark horse candidate canonical: https://time.com/4034898/bernie-sanders-5-things-to-know/ author: Joyce Lee article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-09-15T18:40:39.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T10:56:58.247Z article:section: Politics og:title: 5 Things to Know About Bernie Sanders og:description: What you need to know about the Democratic Party's dark horse candidate og:url: https://time.com/4034898/bernie-sanders-5-things-to-know/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltef49ad7d899f40bd/698863a43c16391087459bb5/sequence-02-00_00_12_28-still001.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Sequence 02.00_00_12_28.Still001 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 5 Things to Know About Bernie Sanders twitter:description: What you need to know about the Democratic Party's dark horse candidate twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltef49ad7d899f40bd/698863a43c16391087459bb5/sequence-02-00_00_12_28-still001.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # 5 Things to Know About Bernie Sanders by [Joyce Lee](https://time.com/author/joyce-lee/) ## Joyce Lee Sep 15, 2015 6:40 PM UTC  by [Joyce Lee](https://time.com/author/joyce-lee/) ## Joyce Lee Sep 15, 2015 6:40 PM UTC Bernie Sanders, the independent, self-described socialist senator from Vermont, has seen support for his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination surge in recent months as his primary opponent, Hillary Clinton, has been caught up in a controversy over her email use while Secretary of State. Sanders’ success is all the more remarkable considering he has eschewed super PAC support and negative campaign gimmicks while proposing a number of far-left policies. Where did Sanders come from and how’d he get here? Watch this video to find out. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4034898/bernie-sanders-5-things-to-know/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4034898/bernie-sanders-5-things-to-know/"},"headline":"5 Things to Know About Bernie Sanders","datePublished":"2015-09-15T18:40:39.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T10:56:58.247Z","description":"What you need to know about the Democratic Party's dark horse candidate","url":"https://time.com/4034898/bernie-sanders-5-things-to-know/","keywords":["Hillary Clinton","GOP","Bernie Sanders","2016 presidential campaign"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltef49ad7d899f40bd/698863a43c16391087459bb5/sequence-02-00_00_12_28-still001.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Joyce Lee","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/joyce-lee/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltef49ad7d899f40bd/698863a43c16391087459bb5/sequence-02-00_00_12_28-still001.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Sequence 02.00_00_12_28.Still001","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4034898/bernie-sanders-5-things-to-know/","name":"5 Things to Know About Bernie Sanders"}}]}] ```