Bernard Sanders

Independent · VT · U.S. Senate

Bio

Bernard Sanders is an American politician and activist serving as the senior United States senator from Vermont, a seat he has held since 2007. He is the longest-serving independent in U.S. congressional history, but maintains a close relationship with the Democratic Party, having caucused with House and Senate Democrats for most of his congressional career and sought the party's presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020. Ideologically a democratic socialist, Sanders is regarded as one of the main leaders of the 21st-century American progressive movement.

Full bio on Wikipedia →

Record of service

In office: 35.7 years
Chambers: House 16y, Senate 19.7y
First took office: 1991 (12 terms)
Seniority: 7 of 100 by time served
Age: 85
Senate class: 1 · senior senator

Leadership

Senate Democratic Outreach Chair · 2023–present

District offices

Burlington, VT · 802-862-0697

FEC filings ↗OpenSecrets ↗GovTrack ↗C-SPAN ↗Ballotpedia ↗Vote Smart ↗House History ↗Facebook ↗X/Twitter ↗YouTube ↗

Service history, offices and identifiers from unitedstates/congress-legislators (public domain). Years served sum each term rather than subtracting the first start date, so a break in service is not counted as time in office.

Reported net worth

2018

$514k

2019

$145k

2020

$556k

2021

$554k

2022

$530k

2023

$580k

2024

$979k

2025

$896k

Most recent filing (2025)

Assets: $662k – $1.8M
Liabilities: $200k – $500k
Net worth: $162k – $1.6M
Since 2018: +$383k

From annual financial disclosures, which report every asset and debt as a bracket — so these are ranges, and the figure shown is their midpoint. A primary residence is not a reportable asset while its mortgage is a reportable debt, which pushes some members negative. How this is calculated →

Overall lean (DW-NOMINATE)

LeftCenterRight

Issue profile

Taxes & Fiscal

D+0.71

Healthcare

D+0.94

Immigration & Border

D+0.95

Guns

D+0.48

Abortion & Reproductive Rights

R+0.71

Environment & Energy

D+0.86

Crime & Policing

D+0.88

Defense & Veterans

D+0.62

Economy & Labor

D+0.89

Foreign Policy & Trade

D+0.76

Civil Rights & Social

D+0.74

Education

D+0.86

Government & Democracy

D+0.76

Judicial & Executive Nominations

D+0.92

Each issue runs left ↔ right, scored from how the member voted on bills tagged to that issue (−1…+1). Issues with too few votes are blank. Overall lean uses DW-NOMINATE.

How they score against the parties

Bernard Sanders's voting record compared with each party's national platform, issue by issue — the same similarity score used across the site.

Green Party

88%Closest

Democratic Socialists (DSA)

87%

87%

84%

53%

31%

On the political map

Bernard Sanders (the large ringed dot) among every current member of Congress and the party platforms.

Party platforms:Communist Party USADemocratic Socialists (DSA)Green PartyDemocratic PartyRepublican PartyLibertarian Party

Each small dot is a current member (Dem · Rep); the larger dots are party platforms — click one for its closest members. Economic axis: taxes, healthcare, labor, energy. Social axis: abortion, guns, immigration, civil rights, crime.

Do you vote like Sanders?

Answer a few questions on the issues and see which members of Congress — and which party — actually line up with you.

Take the 2-minute quiz

Caucuses & committees

Where Sanderssits in Congress's own organization — each group's lean is computed from its members' voting records. Explore them all on the caucuses and committees pages.

Caucuses

Congressional Progressive Caucusstrongly left · 95 members

Committees

Senate Committee on the Budgetcenter · 20 members
Senate Committee on Environment and Public Workscenter · 18 members
Clean Air, Climate, and Nuclear Innovation and Safety Chemical Safety, Waste Management, Environmental Justice, and Regulatory Oversight Fisheries, Water, and Wildlife
Senate Committee on Financecenter · 27 members
Health Care Taxation and IRS Oversight Social Security, Pensions, and Family Policy (Ranking Member)
Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and PensionsRanking Membercenter · 23 members
Employment and Workplace Safety (Ex Officio)Primary Health and Retirement Security (Ex Officio)Education and the American Family (Ex Officio)
Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairscenter · 19 members

Most and least aligned members

Treating Sanders's 14 issue scores as a vector, cosine similarity measures whether two voting records point the same way (+100%) or in opposite directions (−100%) — the colleagues whose records align most and least with theirs.