BRONX Councilman Torres LEADS Sanders Visit to Brownsville Public Housing, Then ENDORSES Sanders.

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On the eve of the New York primary election, Councilman Ritchie Torres of the Bronx announced his surprise endorsement of Bernie Sanders for President today. Torres invoked Sanders’s progressive credentials as the reason for his endorsement:

“Bernie represents a special phenomenon in progressive politics. He singularly has made inequality and poverty the focal point of the presidential election — that is his contribution to progressive politics and he’s energizing young people to an extent never seen before,” Torres said, in an interview with POLITICO New York.

Torres, who grew up in public housing in the Bronx, sent a letter to all the presidential candidates last week asking them to tour New York City Public Housing Authority buildings to see a glimpse of what decades of federal divestment has done to the city’s public housing stock.

Torres grew up in Bronx public housing, and had previously invited all Presidential candidates to tour public housing to see for themselves the toll taken by the last several decades of diminishing public financial support. Both Hillary Clinton and Sanders accepted and carried out NYC public housing visits the last few days. Torres noted that personally hosting Senator Sanders’s visit affected him emotionally quite deeply:

“I was just moved — it meant the world to the residents there to have a presidential candidate tour their homes, to have a presidential candidate come to Brownsville and say ‘I see you and I hear you but above all else I’m willing to invest in you and your home,’” Torres said.

Torres, himself a millenial and the youngest member of the New York City Council, had spent months struggling with the decision of which Democratic candidate to endorse. In an interview last week, he stated that he had yet to decide, saying “My heart is with Bernie but my head is with Hillary.” He expressed praise for the front-runner as well:

“I have immense, deep respect for Secretary Clinton — the endorsement is an affirmation of Bernie Sanders rather than a negation of Hillary Clinton,” Torres said. “I’m endorsing [Sanders] because of what he symbolizes, not because of calculations about his viability but the values that lie at the center of his campaign.”

He was eventually won over by Sanders’s bold progressive agenda and specific commitment to work to close the federal funding gap in public housing. Torres was impressed by the outreach effort by the Sanders campaign, who contacted him weeks ago in his capacity as the chair of the NYC Council public housing committee, and asked him both to host the visit and to give input into Sanders’s own public housing plan:


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http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/04/18/1516904/-Bronx-Councilman-Torres-leads-Sanders-visit-to-Brownsville-public-housing-then-ENDORSES-Sanders

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1. The Bronx is Feeling The Bern!!

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5. Ahhh . . . Brownsville is in Brooklyn

[yourpaljoey]

2. O Yeah!

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3. K&R

[Dragonfli]

4. K&R