https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1CcEUMfpdg
Transcript
[Music] [Applause]
thank you Lei
Valley this is not only a great turnout but you are loud
i think Trump is hearing you in Mara
Lago and he wants to turn down the volume but we ain't going to let
him but let me thank all of you for coming out let me thank the university for allowing us to use this beautiful
facility let me thank Augusta Ko and the
Messengers for their music let me thank Susan Wild and Enid
Santiago and Brian Taylor and Tim Herzock and Harbedo for
their important statements and let me thank Congressman Chris Deluzio for
doing a great job in Washington and for being here today
now when I was in college a few years ago they had a thing called cliffnotes
they still have it all right so in case anybody has a short attention
span I'm going to give you the cliff notes of my remarks first I'm going to say hello to
your Congressman Ryan McKenzie
now we are live streaming this event so Ryan if you're there
hi and then we're going to talk a little bit about what has gone on in the last
terrible frightening 100 days under [Applause]
Trump and then I want to take you on a tour of what's happened in fact over the
last 50 years and why Trump was elected
president and the failures of the Democratic party to stand up for the working
[Applause]
class and maybe most importantly cuz we don't do this at all I want to talk with
you about a vision of where we must go as a
nation because if there's anything I want to convey to you today is of course
yes we must do everything we can to defeat Trumpism but that is not enough
we are the richest country in the history of the
world and there is no reason why every man woman and child in this country does
not have a decent standard of living
[Applause]
and brothers and sisters what I also want to say is that in this unprecedented moment in the modern
history of our country and the world we have got to think in unprecedented ways
we cannot do today what we did yesterday
and that means we need a political revolution in the deepest sense and that
sense that sense understands i'm not Taylor Swift in case
you haven't noticed we're not here as an entertainment show we're not here to
applaud Bernie or Crystalio we are here to transform America and the only
way we do it is by transforming [Applause]
ourselves democracy Democracy is not an entertainment activity it's not looking
at somebody else it's not a beauty contest it's not a concert it is getting active and
standing up for the people next to us the people down the block and the people
across the country [Applause]
so we need to be thinking of new ways and in every part of the country in
every state it may be a little bit different but we got to think of new ways as to how we can be more generous
more effective how we can bring people together to create the kind of nation
that you and I know we can become [Applause]
so let [Music] me begin see I've already gone on for 10
minutes and I'm beginning that's what you learn when you're US Senator by saying hello to Congressman
McKenzie and let me say this Mr congressman we are living in very
difficult times and in your district right here and all across this country
millions of working people are struggling to put food on the table i was just in Harrisburg yesterday we had
a great rally in the evening and earlier in the day I had some time and the
administrators
were kind enough uh to allow me to go to a couple of schools and talk
to some of the kids in Harrisburg beautiful kids
and
one of the kids you know I wanted to hear what was going on in their
lives and one of the kid gets up and says "Well you know I'm living with
my dad
now my parents are separated but my mom is trying to help out she's working at
two jobs right now and she's looking for a third job." All right and this is what is in
fact going on all over this country 60% of our people are living paycheck to
paycheck so I say to Congressman McKenzie you know and everybody in this room knows or should know that there is
a what is called a reconciliation bill in Washington that will be we think
coming to the floor of the House and Senate in the pretty near future and what this bill in general does is it
would make massive cuts over $800 billion in
Medicaid it would make massive cuts in nutrition
programs massive cuts to housing
and all of those savings would be used to provide a
$1.1 trillion tax break for the richest
1% so my message to Congressman McKenzie is don't vote for that terrible piece of
legislation
and if you do I have a strong suspicion
you will be a one-term member of Congress [Applause]
now you know for a number of years in Vermont and around the country I talked
a lot about our nation moving toward an oligarchic form of society and there
were people who were saying "What does oligarchy mean what is Bernie talking about?" Well thanks to Donald Trump we
now know what oligarchy is about
[Applause] when Donald Trump was elected president
and I know it seems like a lot longer time ago but it was only a 100 days when
Trump was elected president he had behind
him three of the wealthiest people in America
you remember who those guys were he had Elon Musk
you know Elon and he had Mr bezos next to him
and he had Mr zuckerberg next to him three wealthiest guys in America
standing right behind the president but that wasn't enough behind those guys you
had 13 other billionaires that Trump had
nominated to become the heads of major federal agencies
[Applause] you know right here in Pennsylvania back in
1863 at that terrible battle of Gettysburg where 20,000 Union
soldiers were either killed or wounded a few days later as you all remember
President Abraham Lincoln came to the battlefield and he looked at that terrible battlefield where just a few
days ago so many people had died and he said in so many words "What we believe
in is a government of the people by the people for the people
and what Trump has made perfectly clear he doesn't hide it
i got to give the guy credit for that that right now we have a government of
the billionaire class by the billionaire class and for the billionaire class and
we are not going to accept
that you have an obscenity in the wealthiest guy in the world running all
over Washington DC firing thousands and thousands of dedicated federal
employees at a time when the Social Security Administration doesn't have
enough employees right now to service the seniors they want to throw away what
they want to do is charge thousands and thousands of people at the Social Security
[Music] Administration at the time at a time when the Veterans Administration is
understaffed they want to lay off
83,000 employees at the VA
well I don't care if you are Republican Democrat or independent we stand with
the veterans of this country and we're not going to see a
deterioration in their health care or in the benefits that they receive
but it is not just oligarchy that we are dealing with today we are looking at an
unprecedented attack on the foundations of American democracy and under Trump a
movement toward [Music] [Applause]
authoritarianism you know the founding fathers of this country were nobody's
dummies you all recall that they had fought and led the fight against the
autocratic king of England the most powerful person on earth at that
time a guy like Trump who thought he had the divine right to
rule and what these guys did founding fathers they said "You know what we see
what the autocrat in England is doing and we're going to have a constitution
which provides for separation of powers right you all remember that from history
class so you got an executive branch the president a legislative branch congress
senate and house and a judiciary of federal courts and the reason we have that separation
of powers is precisely to prevent what Trump is trying to do
today he is usering the powers the appropriation powers of the United
States Congress unbelievable unbelievably when a court decision comes
down that he doesn't like he says "We're going to impeach the [Music] [Applause]
judge." But it's not only Congress and the judiciary he's going after again in
an unprecedented way he is going after the media [Applause]
now this is a guy who throughout his career has leveled the most savage
vicious attacks on his opponents everybody is crazy everybody is awful
everybody is disgusting everybody is terrible and yet when the media criticizes him he wants to sue them and
shut them [Applause] down so we say to Mr trump if you can't
accept criticism get out of the political process that's what democracy
is about
[Applause] and let me talk a little bit about
something that the media doesn't talk about and we don't talk about in Congress at all and that is the reality
that today we have 60% of our people living paycheck to paycheck we have more
income and wealth inequality than we have ever had in the
history of the country and as a result of this disastrous Citizens United
Supreme Court decision we now have a corrupt campaign finance
[Applause] system in which billionaires in both
political parties are controlling the political and legislative agenda
[Applause] and I think this is an issue whether
you're a Republican progressive conservative whatever you may be nobody
thinks that American democracy is about Elon Musk contributing
$270 million to elect Trump and then becoming the most important person in
government so brothers and sisters when we talk
about the future of America and our political system at the top of our
agenda must be the need to end this disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court
decision
and move to public funding of [Applause]
elections now let me tell you something which you're not going to hear much about in the corporate media and you're
not going to hear much about in the halls of Congress and that is that
today that is that today the average American worker in
real inflation accounted for dollars is earning less than he or she did 50 years
ago now you know why the American people are angry they're angry because they're
looking around them they're seeing a huge increase in worker
productivity and yet all of that wealth is going to the people on top not to the
working class of this [Applause] country and we are here tonight we are
here today to say loudly and clearly that we demand an economy that works for
all of us not just the people on top
and by the way we need a Democratic party which makes a fundamental choice
and that is are you on the side of the working class of this country or not
there are millions of working people whose families used to vote Democratic
and they look and they say "Why do we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of almost any major country why
is it that I'm working longer hours for lower wages why is it that I can't afford health care why is it that I
can't afford my rent or my mortgage why is it that I can't afford to send my kid
to college and the Democratic Party is finally going to have to say "We stand
with those people we are prepared to take on the greed of corporate America
but when we talk about the Democratic Party it is not just domestic issues and
I'm going to get into that in a moment it is also foreign policy as
well donald Trump Donald Trump believes that Ukraine
started the war with Russia
well Mr trump get your history correct it was Russia and that terrible dictator
Vladimir Putin that began that war and we will stand with democracy and
not with authoritarian people all over the [Applause]
world but it's not just the Ukraine i strongly oppose Biden's continued
military support to the horrific Netanyahu war against the people of Gaza
[Applause]
[Applause] since that war
began over 50,000 people have been killed over
110,000 wounded and then the entire infrastructure of Gaza has been
destroyed right now as bad as that and I want you to hear this because this is important as bad as what Biden has did
and what Trump is now doing Trump has another idea which is so crazy so
unimaginable that you can't really believe they are seriously talking about it but what they are talking about today
is forcibly expelling 2.2 million
Palestinians from their own place of living
and converting Gaza into a playground for the rich a
new Riviera for Trump and his
friends we will never never allow that to happen
now I work in the US Senate so I am around people who are able to talk more
and say less than any group of human beings in the history of the world so when we talk about where we
want to go as a nation we have got to talk with some specificity not in
general terms and what I'm begging of you is when you hear candidates who want
your vote be tough on them ask them hard
[Applause] questions are they
unequivocally prepared to reject corporate pack
[Applause]
funding at a time when billionaires have enormous power in both parties are they
prepared to work vigorously to overturn Citizens United
[Applause]
today in America the top wealthiest person in
this country if you can believe it owns more wealth than the bottom 53% of
households you got that one guy top 1% owns more wealth than the
bottom 93%
ceos now make 350 times more than their average
[Music] workers so these people on top they are
very religious people but it's a strange kind of
religion you know all of the major religions on
earth speak in one way or another about doing unto others as you would like them
to do unto you right christianity Judaism Islam whatever kind of that's the heart and
soul of many major religions what the religion of these oligarchs are is greed
greed and more greed and that greed is destroying our country
we got to stand up to it and end [Applause]
it so it is not just about not giving them massive tax breaks that Trump wants
it's about telling these large corporations and billionaires they are going to start paying their fair share
of [Applause]
taxes all over America workers want to join unions
[Applause] and they want to join unions because they know that when you're in a union
you can negotiate decent wages working conditions and
benefits but employers know that too and they're making it harder and harder for
workers to join unions that's why we need to pass legislation that punishes
any employer who denies workers the constitutional right to form a
union
here in Pennsylvania and in many parts of this country there are workers
earning starvation wages millions of workers all over America shamefully the
federal minimum wage remains at
$725 an hour can you believe that
nobody in America can live on 7 and a4 an hour that is why we got to raise that
federal minimum wage to at least $17 an
hour as I mentioned I was in Harrisburg yesterday talking to some kids and many
of them want to be able to go to college go to graduate school young lady wanted
to be a pediatrician somebody wanted to be a psychologist others wanted to be construction workers get the training
they need to do the work this country desperately needs but they were all worried about whether or not they could
afford to go to college and the huge kind of debt they would assume if they did go to
college we need the best educated workforce in the
world we need more doctors we need more nurses we need more mental health
counselors we need more electricians sheet metal workers
carpenters young people should not have to go into a lifetime of debt in order
to get the education they need and our country needs from them
22% of seniors in America the richest country on earth are living on
$15,000 a year or less can you believe that try being a senior living on 15,000
try being anybody living on 15,000 some Republicans want to cut
Social Security we are not going to cut Social Security
we're going to expand Social Security by lifting the cap on taxable
income the United States of America today is the only major country on earth
not to guarantee healthcare to all people as a human right
we spend over $14,000 per person on healthcare and yet we got 85 million Americans uninsured
underinsured over 60,000 die each year cuz I can't get to a doctor on
time the function of healthc care is not to make billions for drug companies and
insurance companies
the function of a rational health care system is to provide quality care to
every man woman and child we're going to do that through a Medicare for all single bay
[Applause]
program and all over this country Pennsylvania Vermont and all locations
we are suffering a major housing crisis you got 20 million people
spending 50% or more of their limited incomes on housing
you got 800,000 people sleeping out on the streets instead of spending a
trillion dollars on the military how about building 5 million units of
lowincome and affordable housing
so brothers and sisters this is a difficult moment in
American history but we have had difficult moments in our history
before and I have every confidence that if we are prepared to reject what Trump
and his friends want to do and that is divide us up get us to hate each other for whatever reason the color of our
skin or where we were born or our sexual orientation if we stand together around
an agenda that speaks for working people there is nothing that can stop us
now I'm not going to lie to you the oligarchs they are enormously
powerful they have unlimited amounts of money they control the political process they own the media they own the economy
that's a lot of power but what I believe at the end of the day and I'm not a PhD in
mathematics but I do know that 99% is a hell of a larger number than 1%
so we got a lot of work in front of us we really do and this rally is just a
small part of what we're trying to do we're trying to get you and others to start running for office we need
candidates from school board to Congress we need help in growing the trade union movement between your
organizations on campus dealing with climate and other important [Applause]
issues so let today be the beginning not the end let us go forward and in these
very very difficult times make sure that our grandchildren and those who come
after them look back at this moment and say we stood up we had the courage we
took on authoritarianism and we won thank you
[Applause]
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