Bernie Sanders: Kamala Harris has changed her views on health care, but I have not

Sen. Bernard Sanders said Democratic presidential rival Sen. Kamala D. Harris has changed her views on health care, while arguing that a new proposal of his own amounts to a “clarification” in his “Medicare for All” vision.

“Kamala Harris has changed her views on the health care plan,” Mr. Sanders said in an interview with VICE News published this week. “I have not changed my view on the health care plan. All that I’ve changed my views [on] is if an employer, if an employer is spending less money on health care than they used to, who benefits from that.”

“Our health care plan was not changed by one word. Kamala Harris changed her views on her health care plan in a very significant way,” he said.

Mr. Sanders of Vermont said Ms. Harris of California was a co-sponsor of Medicare for All, but is now not comfortable with it.

“That’s her privilege. I’m not arguing with her. And she does not support what I support,” he said.

The Harris campaign responded by saying that Ms. Harris put forth a plan that experts and analysts say is the best way to get to universal health coverage and most reflects expanding the “actual Medicare program” to all Americans.

Ms. Harris, a co-sponsor of Mr. Sanders’ bill, recently put out her own plan that calls for a longer transition to Medicare-style insurance policies that still envisions a role for the private insurance industry.

Mr. Sanders last week released a plan intended to bolster the strength of labor unions that would require companies to pass on money they would save on contributions to health plans under a Medicare for All system to workers through increased wages or other benefits.

The Vermont independent said his new policy did not amount to a change to his Medicare for All proposal, calling it a “clarification.”

“It was criticized by some of my opponents, but it did not change one word of our plan,” he said. “You got a bill. It’s a long bill. We didn’t change one word of the bill.”