Independent Vermont senator and proud socialist Bernie Sanders will decide by March 2015 whether he makes a run for the White House.
In an interview published Friday with the Associated Press, Sanders says he will only run if he knows he has a shot at winning.
“I don’t want to do it unless I can do it well,” he said. “I don’t want to do it unless we can win this thing.”
The Vermont senator said that it would be a “gut decision” and he is still not sure whether he would run as an independent or mount a left-wing challenge against likely candidate Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary.
If Sanders does run, he told the AP he would stress a progressive economic agenda that would promise to tackle the problem of economic inequality and switch America’s energy supply away from fossil fuels.
Democratic consultants are dismissive of Sanders’ chances in the 2016 race, stating that there isn’t that large of a “socialist” base in the party.
“I think the question is, is he a step too far for the mainstream of the Democratic Party? He is a socialist,” Kathy Sullivan, a member of the Democratic National Committee, told the AP. “I don’t think you’ll find the socialist wing of the Democratic Party is that big, contrary to what Republicans might think.”
Sanders frequently calls his ideology “democratic socialism”, and defines it as the high-tax, expansive government systems that countries like Sweden have adopted. (RELATED: Bernie Sanders Explains His Socialist Paradise)