Democratic frontrunner Bernie Sandershas made fighting against income inequality a significant part of his platform. Despite Sanders' efforts to gain the support of low-income voters, their voter turnout at the polls is extremely low. Sanders said that many of his losses to Hillary Clinton in the primaries thus far are because "poor people don't vote."
When Sanders was asked why Clinton has beat him in 16 of 17 states with the highest income inequality on NBC's Meet the Press, Sanders said, "Well, because poor people don't vote." He continued, "I mean, that's just a fact. That's a sad reality of American society," The Washington Post reports.
Sanders noted that "80 percent of poor people did not vote" in the 2014 election. "If we can significantly increase voter turnout so that low-income people and working people and young people participated in the political process, if we got a voter turnout of 75 percent, this country would be radically transformed," Sanders told host Chuck Todd.
Sanders has designed his platform to gain the support of poor voters: he advocates increased minimum wage, guaranteed paid family leave, and free college tuition at public universities. According to network exit polls, however, Sanders has actually lost support from voters with incomes below $50,000 to Clinton.
Clinton spent Saturday campaigning in Connecticut and Rhode Island, while Sanders campaigned in Rhode Island today. Sanders is expected to win in both states that vote on Tuesday, although Clinton's rally in Rhode Island which had a large turn out of voters with an average annual income of $28,000 is a promising sign for her.
