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FIRST ON FOX: Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who criss-crossed the nation final 12 months on a “Combat Oligarchy” tour with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., spent over $550,000 in 2025 on non-public jet journey for himself utilizing marketing campaign funds, a Fox Information Digital evaluation of Federal Election Fee (FEC) filings discovered.
Nearly all of the spending got here within the first two quarters, which cowl up till July. That can also be when Sanders and AOC had the vast majority of their tour stops throughout the nation.
In April, between stops on the tour, Fox Information Digital solely obtained a photograph of Sanders boarding a luxurious Bombardier Challenger non-public jet on the Meadows Subject Airport in Bakersfield, California. The supply additionally indicated that that they had noticed the New York congresswoman boarding the non-public jet as nicely.
The pair have been subsequently additionally seen in footage obtained by Fox Information Digital exiting the airplane in Sacramento later that night, close to the place the self-identified Democratic socialists hosted a second rally in at some point.
AOC’S CAMPAIGN POURS MASSIVE CASH INTO LUXURY PUERTO RICO HOTELS, PRICEY CATERING AND BAD BUNNY VENUE RENTAL
In keeping with a photograph captured by a supply on the bottom and shared solely with Fox Information Digital, Sanders boarded the posh Bombardier Challenger non-public jet on the Meadows Subject Airport in Bakersfield, Calif., on Tuesday afternoon. Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, whom the supply additionally noticed boarding the non-public jet, spoke at their “Preventing Oligarchy” occasion in Bakersfield simply hours earlier than. (Fox Information Digital)
The Bombardier Challenger non-public jet the pair flew on was operated by Ventura Air Providers, which touts “one of many widest cabins of any enterprise jet accessible as we speak” and offers “superior cabin consolation for its passengers.” In keeping with their web site, the non-public jet can value as much as $15,000 an hour.
In 2025, in line with Sanders’ FEC filings, he spent no less than $354,000 in marketing campaign funds to pay for personal jet companies by Ventura Jets. The opposite non-public jet corporations Sanders spent marketing campaign funds on included N-Jet and Cirrus Aviation Providers.
In keeping with N-Jet’s web site, the corporate pieds itself on their “private contact,” including that prospects will “arrive in type along with your luxurious, consolation, and security at all times prime of thoughts.”
Sanders, who has been a vocal supporter of the Inexperienced New Deal, the aggressive local weather change coverage concentrating on carbon emissions and fossil gasoline manufacturing, and has known as local weather change an “existential risk” to the world, was pressed about his non-public jet use final 12 months, prompting him to inform Fox Information’ “Particular Report” host Bret Baier that “that is the one technique to get round.”
“You run a marketing campaign, and also you do three or 4 or 5 rallies in per week. [It is] the one approach you may get round to speak to 30,000 folks. You suppose I am gonna be sitting on a ready line at United…whereas 30, 000 individuals are ready?” Sanders stated.
“That is the one technique to get round. No apologies for that. That is what marketing campaign journey is about. We have completed it up to now. We’re gonna do it in future.”
SWALWELL IN THE HOT SEAT AFTER SPENDING OVER $200K IN CAMPAIGN CASH ON CHILDCARE: ‘SLIPPERY SLOPE’
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., greet the group collectively throughout a “Preventing Oligarchy” tour occasion at Arizona State College, Thursday, March 20, 2025, in Tempe, Ariz. (Ross D. Franklin)
Sanders has an extended historical past of utilizing non-public jets on the marketing campaign path. Throughout his failed 2020 presidential marketing campaign, the Sanders marketing campaign spent over $1.9 million on non-public jets, together with Apollo Jets and the Superior Aviation Crew, a Virginia-based non-public jet firm.
Non-public jets have confronted the ire of Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez’s fellow local weather activists. In keeping with the 2021 Transport and Surroundings report, non-public jets are as much as 14 instances extra polluting than business planes.
“For actual, what number of non-public jets do these CEOs want? It’s insatiable. It’s unacceptable,” Ocasio-Cortez stated in 2023, in a single instance of the New York congresswoman herself railing towards non-public jets.
Fox Information Digital reached out to Sanders’ workplace and his marketing campaign for touch upon the spending however didn’t obtain a response in time for publication.
“You do not anticipate a socialist to fly business do you?” quipped conservative political communications advisor Matt Gorman. “There isn’t any greater hypocrite than the liberal who chastises us for consuming meat and utilizing gasoline stoves, but flies in non-public jets.”
Along with Sanders’ hefty non-public jet spending that got here throughout his tour with AOC, the New York Democratic socialist additionally spent large sums of marketing campaign {dollars} at luxurious and “boutique” motels in states the place the pair held their “Combat Oligarchy” Tour.
Rep. Alexandria Oacsio-Cortez (D-NY) waves to the group forward of Zohran Mamdani ‘s inauguration because the 112th mayor at Metropolis Corridor on Thursday January 1, 2026 in New York, NY. (David Dee Delgado/Getty Photos)
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For instance, AOC’s marketing campaign paid The Leo Kent Lodge, a boutique high-rise in Tucson, $3,165.76, across the time of a “Combat Oligarchy” rally that was held there, in line with an FEC submitting from April 25. In 2025, AOC additionally spent 1000’s at luxurious motels just like the Asher Adams Lodge in Salt Lake Metropolis, the Lodge Vermont in Burlington, The Langham-Huntington lodge in Pasadena, Calif., Lodge El Convento in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the Lansdowne Resort & Spa in rural Virginia, and extra.
Fox Information Digital requested representatives for AOC if the congresswoman felt like she wanted to clarify her greater than $53,000 in marketing campaign spending on upscale motels throughout the nation in 2025, however didn’t obtain a response.
Fox Information Digital’s Cameron Cawthorne, Andrew Mark Miller and Deirdre Heavey (previously) contributed to this report.
