If you take donations from Wall Street, you can't be independent.

The future of the Democratic Party, the future of this country is involving young people in the political process, getting them to stand up for their rights, dealing with student debt, which I got to tell you is just crushing people all over this country, making public colleges and universities tuition free, those are the ideas we are bringing out, demanding the wealthy and large corporations start paying their fair share of taxes. This is what younger people, working class people want. That is the future of the Democratic Party.

Today, the United States is No. 1 in corporate profits, No. 1 in CEO salaries, No. 1 in childhood poverty and No. 1 in income and wealth inequality in the industrialized world.

People are tired of working longer hours for lower wages, of seeing decent paying jobs go to China and other low-wage countries, of billionaires not paying any federal income taxes and of not being able to afford a college education for their kids - all while the very rich become much richer.

Super PACs and a corrupt campaign finance system are destroying American democracy. We're proud that we have received four million individual contributions, more than any candidate in American history at this point.

In America, we are living in a society which is moving more and more toward an oligarchic form of society where government is dominated heavily by big-money interests.

The middle class is collapsing and we are moving toward an oligarchic form of society, where the billionaires will control the economy and the political life of the country.