The Senate health committee passed legislation that would reform health care in America. A good start, the measure includes provisions by Senator Bernie Sanders to expand primary care for millions of Americans.  A Sanders amendment doubling penalties for fraud also was adopted unanimously in the committee. Elsewhere on Capitol Hill, support grew for the senator’s proposal to audit the Federal Reserve and demand accountability for more than $2 trillion in secret subsidies to banks. In Vermont, dairy farms are being forced out of business while the processor that dominates the New England milk market is posting big profits. Sanders sought help from the secretary of agriculture and the head of the antitrust division of the Justice Department.

Health Industry Reform As a member of the Senate health committee, Sanders voted to send a reform bill to the Senate floor that includes a his proposal to dramatically improve primary care by expanding community health centers. A Sanders amendment doubling penalties for fraud by health care providers passed 23 to 0, but an amendment that would let states experiment with single-payer health programs was turned back by the committee.  On Monday, some of the more than 4,400 people who wrote to Bernie about their experiences with health came together in his Burlington office.  To watch the press conference, click here.  To read their stories and other in a new booklet, “The Health Care Crisis: Letters from Vermont and America,” click here.  To read about the senator’s anti-fraud amendment, click here. To watch the senator discuss successful public health care plans, click here. 

Family Dairy Farms Sanders has called what’s happening to Vermont dairy farmers “a disaster in the making.”  He met with U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack about ways to raise payments to farmers, and brought in Assistant Attorney General Christine Varney, the antitrust division chief, to seek “a very serious look” at Dean Foods Inc., which dominates some two-thirds of the New England milk market. While Vermont farmers struggle to stay afloat, Dean Foods made $76.2 million in the first quarter of 2009, a 147 percent increase from the same period a year earlier. "I don't think it takes Sherlock Holmes to see a connection between the two," Sanders said.  To read the Brattleboro Reformer article on the farm owned by the Ranney family since 1796 going up for sale, click here.  To watch the senator’s remarks after the meeting with the USDA leader, click here. 

Fed Secrecy and Banker Bonuses Stepping up a campaign for Federal Reserve accountability, Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday questioned whether some of more than $2.2 trillion in secret subsidies went to Goldman Sachs and other bailed-out banks now planning to shower executives with huge bonuses.  Sanders voiced his concern in a letter to Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and during remarks at an Economic Policy Institute conference. Without stopping to thank taxpayers, Goldman reported that its profits surged on second-quarter income of $3.44 billion.  The turnaround came less than a year after reckless investments by Goldman and other Wall Street firms triggered a worldwide recession and drove many rivals out of business.  Read more here.

Green Jobs The Vermont congressional delegation announced economic stimulus funding for a Vermont wind turbine company.  Barre’s Northern Power Systems was granted $683,388 in recovery funds for one of 28 wind energy projects supported nationwide through the Department of Energy.  Sanders, chairman of the Senate’s green jobs subcommittee, said, “We must move, as aggressively as possible, to become energy independent, to address the crisis of greenhouse gas emissions and global warming and, in the process, create millions of new jobs over a period of years in the clean-energy field. Federal investment in Vermont’s green jobs sector is another welcome sign that Vermont can be a national leader in this area.”  Sanders’ subcommittee will hold a hearing June 21 to get a state and local perspective on clean energy jobs and economic recovery from four governors, a state legislator, and three mayors, including Burlington’s Bob Kiss.  To read more about green jobs, click here.

Supreme Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor sat through four long days of confirmation hearings by the Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy. By week’s end, she appeared headed toward confirmation by the full Senate..

Lake Champlain This summer, Vermont, New York, and Quebec are celebrating the 400th anniversary of Samuel de Champlain’s exploration of the lake that now bears his name.  Bernie Sanders was mayor of Burlington in the 1980s and worked to revitalize the waterfront parks where many of the anniversary events were held.  “The lake plays an enormously important role economically, culturally, recreationally for our people, and we've got to work hard to make sure that it remains the vital resource that it is," the senator said.