Senator Bernie Sanders stood at the same New York City pulpit where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once condemned the Vietnam War and warned that a small circle of billionaires now controls both the American economy and its politics.
Story Snapshot
- Sanders delivered a major foreign policy address Monday night at Riverside Church in New York City.
- The event, called “We Shall Not Be Moved,” came one day before the United Nations General Assembly opened.
- Sanders linked income inequality, oligarchy, climate change and artificial intelligence as global, not just American, problems.
- Riverside Church previously hosted Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1967 antiwar speech and a post-prison address by Nelson Mandela.
A Historic Pulpit, A New Warning
Sanders delivered the address at Riverside Church one day before world leaders gathered for the United Nations General Assembly. The event, billed “We Shall Not Be Moved,” took place at the same church where King gave his 1967 “Beyond Vietnam” speech and where Mandela once spoke after his release from prison.
Sanders told the crowd that “income inequality, oligarchy, the climate crisis, the threat of AI” are not just American problems. He announced the event himself online beforehand, framing it as a chance to connect struggles at home with challenges facing working people around the world.
Global Stakes Named in the Speech
The Vermont senator argued that a small group of wealthy people and corporations now hold more power than at almost any point in modern history. “Never before have so few people concentrated so much wealth and so much power,” Sanders said, according to translated excerpts of his remarks.
Sanders also criticized recent U.S. military action, calling for an end to what he described as Trump’s “disastrous war” in Iran. He tied that critique to broader complaints about defense spending, arguing money spent on conflict abroad comes at the cost of anti-poverty programs at home.
A Venue With a Long History of Dissent
Riverside Church has hosted major foreign policy addresses for nearly six decades. King used the same pulpit in 1967 to publicly break with the Johnson administration over Vietnam, calling the U.S. government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” Mandela later addressed the same congregation after leaving prison, cementing the church’s role as a stage for global moral appeals.
"Sen. Sanders (I-VT) Delivers Foreign Policy Speech Ahead of U.N. General Assembly
Ahead of the United Nations General Assembly, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) delivers a foreign policy address at New York City's historic Riverside Church."https://t.co/YKTa0ZQiZw— Conrad Hubbard (@conradhubbard) September 22, 2026
The Nation published the full text of Sanders’s remarks, describing the event as a keynote address held in celebration of the church’s activist history. Fox News and Fox Business also carried the speech live, bringing the address to national audiences on the eve of the United Nations gathering.
The speech came during a week when world leaders converged on New York, giving Sanders’s warnings about concentrated wealth and power a wide international audience. His remarks did not single out one political party. Instead, he pointed to a broader system he says rewards the powerful over ordinary people in both parties and across borders.
Sources:
facebook.com, thenation.com, foxbusiness.com, eldiario.es
