WASHINGTON, March 6 – Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) issued the following statement after the House Committee on Education and Labor advanced a bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour by 2024:

“Three years ago the idea of a $15 minimum wage seemed ‘radical’ and ‘unrealistic.’ Today, because of the American people standing up and fighting back, five states have passed a $15 minimum wage and in an historic vote the House Education and Labor Committee advanced legislation for a living wage of $15 an hour.

“Let me congratulate Chairman Bobby Scott and every Democrat on the House Education and Labor Committee for moving a bill forward that would give nearly 40 million Americans a raise. In the year 2019, no one in the United States of America should be living in poverty. A job should lift Americans out of poverty, not keep them in it.”