CDP's Edano to visit Washington, hopes to meet with Sen. Bernie Sanders

TOKYO -- Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) leader Yukio Edano aims to meet U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders during a Sept. 11-16 visit to the United States.

The CDP was founded on the platform of "practicing democracy from the grassroots level," and Edano hopes to receive advice from Senator Sanders, who developed his own grassroots movement involving young people during his run for the Democratic Party nomination for the 2016 presidential election. However, Sanders has been busy with his campaign for the U.S. congressional midterm elections coming in November, and efforts to set a meeting with him are ongoing.

Edano's visit will be primarily focused in Washington, and along with meetings with U.S. government officials and related parties, he is set to give lectures at think tanks and universities. It will be Edano's first international trip since the CDP's founding in October 2017.

CDP Secretary-General Tetsuro Fukuyama, who will be accompanying Edano, said, "(In Washington) there are people who were part of the (U.S.) administration during the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) government, and with whom we conducted diplomatic work. It is important to feel out the situation since the advent of the Trump administration first-hand."

(Japanese original by Masahiro Tateno, Political News Department)