In 2016, the Democratic Party’s nominee for president was openly dismissive of universal healthcare, calling Medicare for All a “theoretical” idea “that will never, ever come to pass.” Apparently unashamed of her visible and longstanding alliances with corporate America, Hillary Clinton’s campaign stopped well short of full-throated support for progressive policies like a $15 minimum wage and proudly boasted about bipartisan endorsements from Republican lawmakers.

He wasn’t even on the stage, but if last night’s debate is any indication, the 2016 runner-up for the Democratic nomination has successfully shaped the party’s conversation ahead of 2020. With only a few exceptions, a majority of the ten-strong assembly of mostly conventional Democratic politicians were practically jumping over one another to pledge their fealty to key aspects of Bernie Sanders’s agenda, at crucial moments echoing both his proposals and elements of his wider narrative about American politics.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, who once served as a campaign manager for Hillary Clinton, thinks it’s time the Democratic Party was reclaimed by working people, assuring the crowd that “there’s plenty of wealth [in America], it’s just in the wrong hands.” Tim Ryan, meanwhile, wants a “working-class party.”