The 2016 presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders, the junior United States Senator and former Representative from Vermont, began with a formal announcement by Sanders on May 26, 2015, in Burlington, Vermont, which followed an informal announcement on April 30. Sanders had been considered a potential candidate for President of the United States since at least September 2014. Although Sanders began the campaign as an independent, he routinely caucused with the Democratic Party in the Senate, as many of his views align with Democrats, and chose to stay in the Democratic Party.