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Releasing 10 years of federal tax returns, 77-year-old Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) had some explaining to do after it revealed he’s become a millionaire since his 2016 presidential campaign. Sanders routinely rails against millionaires-and-billionaires, talking about the shrinking U.S. middle class, but, more importantly, the obscene levels of wealth controlled by less that one percent of the population. Bernie’s returns showed he earned an Adjusted Gross Income of $461.293 in 2018, $1,131,925 in 2017 and $1,062,626 in 2016, revealing he’s in the top one percent of U.S. income earners. Speaking at a Fox News town hall in Bethlehem, Pa., Sanders told hosts Brett Baier and Martha MacCallum that he wouldn’t apologize for writing a best-selling book. Bernie’s answer for paying for his Medicare-for-All health care is to hike the taxes on corporations and one-percenters.

Before Sander’s best-selling books “Our Revolution” and “Where We Go From Here,” Sanders earned $205,271 in 2014, when he was a lowly member of the U.S. Senate. Baier asked Sanders whether he benefited from President Donald Trump’s tax cuts, something he’s attacked since Trump signed Tex Reform Dec. 22, 2017. Questioned about his new-found riches, Sanders got defensive. “It comes from a book I wrote, pretty good book,” Sanders told Baier and MacCallum. “If anyone thinks that I should apologize for writing a best-selling book, I’m sorry, I not going to do it,” recognizing the inconsistency of ranting about Trump’s tax cuts, while, at the same time, benefiting Bernie. Bernie urged Trump to release his taxes, something Democrats have pressured Trump to do since the 2016 election. Bernie likes to keep the focus off himself and onto what can be done to save the American middle class.

Bernie’s campaign in 2016 and now in 2019 has much in common, talking about spreading around the wealth in the United States. Pointing out that the U.S. is the richest Western democracy without national health care, Bernie advocates Medicare-for-All but can’t explain how he’d pay for the estimated $100 trillion price tag. Talking about taxing corporations and the rich doesn’t come close to the cash needed for the government to finance national health care. Citing Canada or Scandinavia countries as models of national health care, Bernie doesn’t see the differences in population. Average populations in Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Norway and Iceland, are well under 6 million people. Even Canada, with its 37 million population, ranked 11th in global GDP, has about one-fifteenth the GDP of the U.S. Sanders Medicare-for-All plan would shrink U.S. GDP by 10%, plunging the economy into recession.

Baier and MacCallum tried to get Bernie off his high horse, looking at reality, not pie-in-the-sky. In Bernie’s world the federal government should subsidize free health care, college tuition and continue funding Social Security and Medicare benefits for the elderly and disabled. Bernie says he won’t apologize for doing well with his best-selling books. But what would he do if he plunged the U.S. economy into recession, causing today’s unemployment to skyrocket back to double-digits. Speaking on Fox News, Bernie called Trump a “pathological liar,” because he made a campaign gaffe about his father’s German birthplace, when, in fact, he was born in the Bronx in 1905. Bernie gave his typical spiel, giving his utopian vision of the future with free health care and college tuition. His message appeals to young people, too buried in college debt to get close to the American Dream.

Several Democrat candidates like Senators Kristen Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) have adopted some of Bernie’s promises, especially when it comes to health care and free college tuition. Rep. Beto O’Rourke has copied Bernie’s talking points, creating a populous message appealing to young voters. Sanders now finds himself dogged by his new-found riches, undercutting his message about spreading around the wealth. Bernie has difficulty talking about how he’s going to pay for his Medicare-for-All and free college tuition, not to mention his trillion dollar infrastructure program designed to put millions of Americans back to work. Bernie has difficulty when asked about how the numbers add up, largely because they don’t. Whether he’s a true believer or not, the Bethlehem, Pa. audience liked his message.

Bernie has no answer for how he became a millionaire after running-and-losing in the Democrat primaries to former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. While there’s nothing wrong with Bernie cashing in on is new-found fame, it’s still difficult for the self-avowed Democrat Socialist to accept himself a red-blooded American capitalist. Talking about raising taxes on corporations and high-income earners, Bernie can’t explain the impact of tax hikes on the U.S. poor and middle class. If the nation plunges into recession, Bernie has no answer how ordinary citizens would pay for food, rent, health care or anything else. Bernie admitted that only slamming Trump won’t win Democrats the White House in 2020. It’s difficult for Democrats to rip the president’s performance on the U.S. economy. Voters will have to ask themselves in 2020 whether they’re willing to change horses.