Bernie Sanders defends proposals: "The numbers add up perfectly"
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders defended himself Sunday against accusations from Hillary Clinton that he's promising more than he can deliver.
"Needless to say, I strongly disagree with that assertion," Sanders, an independent senator from Vermont, told "Face the Nation" moderator John Dickerson when asked about Clinton's criticism that the numbers behind Sanders' policy proposals simply don't add up.
"The numbers add up perfectly," he said. "The issue is - Do we have the guts to take on the wealthy and the powerful in corporate America, who today have so much wealth and so much power?"
He cited his proposal to make public colleges and universities tuition-free. "That's not a radical idea, it exists in Germany [and] in Scandinavia," he explained. "But it does require us to take on Wall Street and impose a tax on speculation."
He also referenced his proposal to close offshore tax havens and use the revenue to fund infrastructure improvements.
"If we talk about creating 13 million jobs rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, it does require us to come up with a trillion dollars by ending this outrageous loophole such that corporations can put their money in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda and other tax havens, not pay a nickel in taxes," Sanders said. "So it's not that our numbers don't' add up. What does add up is our desire and the feeling that we have to take on corporate America, who in some cases pay - major corporations pay zero in federal income taxes in a year."