Bernie Sanders slams billionaires ‘who own the media’ and warns of emerging oligarchy

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) wants Americans to “stay focused” on the most important issues of our time and warned of a burgeoning oligarchy after the three richest men on the planet saw the President Donald Trump will be sworn in Monday. .

Sanders noted Tuesday on CNN’s “The Source” that a handful of billionaires have already acquired major news publications and social media platforms, and he sounded the alarm after being asked about Elon Musk, owner of X (formerly Twitter), which could buy TikTok.

“This is oligarchy,” Sanders told host Kaitlan Collins. “You have Jeff Bezos, who owns the Washington Post, Mr. Musk already owns Twitter, you have other billionaires who own the major media outlets in this country, CNN, and other companies.”

“If you look at who they own, you look at the big Wall Street companies,” the progressive senator continued. “So you already have a major and serious problem in terms of media ownership. If Musk ends up owning TikTok, it will only make the situation worse.”

Trump confirmed Tuesday that he was open to the idea of ​​Musk buying TikTok.

This option is possible thanks to former President Joe Biden’s signing in April last year of a $95 billion foreign aid bill for Israel and Ukraine, which also included a measure requiring TikTok to divest from ByteDance, its Chinese parent company, under penalty of being banned. in the United States

Supporters of the bill believe TikTok poses a threat to national security. However, Sanders, who voted against it because of his funding for Israel, said last week on

“We need a media that is not afraid to speak out on the issues of the day, and that will not be possible when a small number of very wealthy people control what we see, hear and read,” said the 83-year-old president. said a former Democrat on CNN, noting that these people have recently “kind of caved to Trump.”

These fears have long been justified, but they became starkly evident at Trump’s inauguration, which was attended by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Bezos and Musk – some of whom had previously publicly criticized Trump.