Becca Balint

“These are very difficult times for our country and the world, and in many ways, this 2024 election is the most consequential election in our lifetimes,” Sanders, an independent, said in his announcement video . “Will the United States continue to even function as a democracy, or will we move to an authoritarian form of government? … These are just some of the questions that together we need to answer and that I look forward to discussing with you on the campaign trail.”

WASHINGTON— Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont announced Monday that he will seek reelection, citing a need to continue his work on issues ranging from codifying abortion rights on the federal level to lowering health care costs.

Sanders is best known for injecting progressive ideas into the bloodstream of America, such as Medicare for All and a minimum wage increase, through his presidential campaigns in 2016 and 2020. Though he was unsuccessful in securing the Democratic nomination both times, he managed to pull Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, the party’s nominees in the cycles he ran, left.

Throughout his career, he also maneuvered his way into more power, from mayor of Burlington, to member of the House of Representatives, to the Senate. Today, he is chair of the powerful Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, a position that has given him concrete institutional power.

His allies had expressed a strong desire for him to run for reelection. In an interview ahead of his announcement, former Ohio state Senator Nina Turner, a former Sanders presidential campaign co-chair, noted how few high-profile progressives have the broad recognition that Sanders does.

“[If he runs it means] he still feels like there’s more to do in his elected capacity and that he does understand … that he is still very much needed in that elected space, especially in the Senate,” Turner said. “Certainly we have a lot more progressive types in the House of Representatives but we have very few progressives in the United States Senate, and so yeah we need him on that wall and he knows it.”

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Sanders’s announcement ends speculation about whether he would seek a fourth term, a decision that drew fast praise from progressives.

“It is absolutely critical that we have his voice in the Senate, and I’m really grateful that I’m going to have more time to serve alongside him on all the issues that he and I both care deeply about,” said Representative Becca Balint, a Democrat from Vermont, who told the Globe she spoke with Sanders this morning. “I’m thrilled he’s running again.”

Sanders is expected to cruise into reelection; he currently has no serious challengers.

“I don’t think he’ll run in the next race after this one, so that gives us six years to pull together a strategy, find a good candidate and challenge whoever steps up,” said Joshua Bechhoefer, the Republican county chair for Addison County, Vermont.

His status as a curmudgeon in some ways made him an unlikely political icon. But his anger at the status quo has often resonated with supporters frustrated with a political system that they felt had left them with few good choices.

“I hope that my efforts …. Will be seen as a turning point in American politics and a blueprint for the future,” Sanders said in his 2016 book, “Our Revolution.”

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With reporting by Charlotte Ehrlich.

Lissandra Villa de Petrzelka can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her @LissandraVilla.