House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) hold a Capitol Hill sit-in.
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00:00I love you. I'm just going to give you a hug.
00:02Happy birthday, Michael.
00:04And anybody else who wants to come up?
00:06Sir, what's your name?
00:08I'm Emmanuel. I'm good friends with your cousin Pam.
00:10Emmanuel is friends with my cousin Pam.
00:12He sat there for the whole 25 hours.
00:18Pam, why don't you sit behind me now?
00:20Now you're suddenly shy?
00:22Dr. Pam LaVille, he's an emergency room doctor.
00:26He's a young man.
00:28Introduce him.
00:30Thank you, Sarah, for being here.
00:40You work at the State Department.
00:42Thank you for being out here today.
00:44Okay, now we can get back to our teaching.
00:46So, the way they try to take our power is they start with a pen.
00:58And on January 20th, the pen started writing that we didn't have the right to citizenship even if we were born here.
01:08We didn't have the right to learn our history if it said race.
01:12If it said diversity.
01:14That government should not function if we care about inclusion.
01:18These were all executive orders.
01:20I won't even go through all of them because there were too many to go through.
01:24Because chaos is not a cause.
01:26But chaos had a cause.
01:28And it started with these executive orders.
01:30But the lawsuits started immediately.
01:32This is what you have to understand and I think people know.
01:36The lawsuits started immediately because our first tool in the toolbox, in addition to our voice,
01:42is our ability to have lawyers who go to court and say this is unconstitutional.
01:46And actually, Mr. President, you don't have the power of the pen Congress does.
01:52Because the founders gave the pen to these people.
01:58These people.
01:59The only reason these people have the pen is because we gave it to them.
02:02As the people.
02:03So that litigation started winning, by the way.
02:07We won.
02:08There have been lawsuits that have won temporary orders.
02:12Temporary.
02:13They're ongoing.
02:14From Trump appointees.
02:15From Trump appointees.
02:16This is the other thing.
02:17It is not about a court system that has an ideology when we have the right judges on the bench.
02:23Another thing we fight for is making sure we have the right judges on the bench.
02:27The right judges aren't about what party they're affiliated with.
02:30The right judges are about whether their positions are principled on the law
02:36and on the facts.
02:37And so we have had Trump appointed judges saying,
02:40oh, you can't do that.
02:42But we've had that because we've had lawyers that went into court.
02:46So then what happens?
02:48Their executive orders attacking lawyers for even representing clients and going to court and saying,
02:56we'll use our pen to say, oh, Perkins Coie and others, you can't go in these buildings.
03:04Which means you can't represent your clients.
03:07Which means we're telling your clients not to hire you as law firms.
03:10By the way, these are private businesses.
03:12Last I heard, the Republican Party actually liked free market system and the private sector.
03:17We're talking about the private sector.
03:19We're also talking about public attorneys eventually because we'll get to the not-for-profit attacks.
03:25But the point is, once you see the power of the ability to have rights and to have legal representation,
03:34we see an administration attack it.
03:37And then we see some law firms capitulate.
03:40But then we see some other law firms that stand up and go to court and say,
03:45it is unlawful for you to tell us that we can't represent our clients.
03:49To block us from public buildings.
03:52To represent our clients who have a legal right to be represented and a right to choose us.
03:59So they are litigating now in courts.
04:02But then let's go back to what we're seeing that you just called out.
04:07We are seeing people with rights like Kilmar Aprego Garcia,
04:12who was protected with an order from the United States government that he could not be sent back to El Salvador
04:23because his life would be endangered.
04:26And this case, let's be clear, is not just about Kilmar.
04:32It's about the fact that even when the government said,
04:36oh, we were wrong, that was an error.
04:39Oops.
04:42Literally, oops.
04:44And no, we won't go back and ask a dictator to return a person we should have never sent.
04:51And we know about all the other people, young men, Venezuelan, sent to El Salvador.
04:58First of all, Venezuelan sent to El Salvador.
05:01That is not normal, people.
05:03Sent to El Salvador intentionally because it is a rights abusing prison.
05:10And so we are seeing our eight American Civil Liberties Union as a member organization litigating to say,
05:20no, no, you can't.
05:23And many, many, many of these cases, there are restraining orders being entered against the government.
05:30And this administration saying, what exactly? What order? What order?
05:37Again, not normal.
05:39Not normal that this Supreme Court, which many of us would call a captured court,
05:44a court that has sadly lost a lot of public trust for ignoring its own case precedence.
05:51Even this court said, wait, no, we don't think you are abiding sufficiently to protect the rights of Kilmer Abrego Garcia.
06:04So the courts, so this is the next line of attack, and we're seeing this moving now.
06:11It's taking power away from the courts to be able to issue those orders that say, yeah, no, you can't do this.
06:24That if it's a nationwide injunction, that just means that a judge can say, you're going to hurt people everywhere.
06:32We think you don't have the right to do this.
06:34We are going to say you have to stop until we finish this litigation.
06:39We don't know how it's going to come out, but we think there's a strong enough case,
06:43there's enough likelihood you're going to hurt people all over the country that we're going to say you have to hold on that.
06:51That's all that means.
06:53And yet now we have elected officials trying to take the power from the courts to protect us from the harm of an administration that thinks chaos is a cause.
07:08Explain what's going on.
07:10Yeah.
07:11Well, I think to go back to the foundational point, which then leads us to this moment,
07:20is that, you know, this in many ways, what we are navigating through right now was the worst nightmare of the framers of the Constitution.
07:30And we've talked about the fact they were not perfect.
07:33They certainly had flaws, but they tried to set us on a march toward a more perfect union.
07:39And at that Constitutional Convention that took place in Philadelphia, 1787, historians have assessed that the word that was used the most during the Constitutional Convention certainly wasn't what I may have thought that word would be.
07:59My first guess probably would have been democracy.
08:04Now, democracy was in heavy rotation.
08:09That's my music terminology.
08:10It was in heavy rotation, but it wasn't the word that was used the most.
08:16Probably would have said, well, what about liberty?
08:19It's also used frequently, but it wasn't the word that was used the most by the assessment of historians.
08:25Third guess, I probably would have said freedom.
08:30Also in heavy rotation, but it was not the word that was used the most.
08:34The word that was used the most during the Constitutional Convention when the framers were trying to construct this republic that we've now inherited was demigod.
08:45Wow.
08:46It was demigod.
08:47Wow.
08:48It was demigod.
08:49Think about it.
08:50They were trying to break free from a world where kings dominated.
08:54Wow.
08:55And so they were trying to construct a system that would be resilient enough to prevent the emergence of a singular figure like a king.
09:08And that was the whole premise behind separate and co-equal branches of government.
09:15It's interesting because Alexander Hamilton apparently used the word the most by some calculations 13 or 14 different times in the Constitution and Convention.
09:28And he said his greatest fear for the future of this country that was being built was that one day a demigod might get elected and over a four year period of time tried to turn into a tyrant.
09:45It was the framers worst fear and nightmare and now we're confronting someone who's acting like a king as opposed to trying to govern like the president.
10:00But the thing is we were given, we were given the tools to push back against it.
10:06That was the whole premise of separate and co-equal branches of government, which is why here in the Congress, as we sit here getting ready to enter into weeks of debate around this reckless, dangerous, un-American budget that they're trying to jam down our throats,
10:23is that we don't work for a president, we don't have a monarch, we don't have a dictator.
10:31In America we have a democracy. The people of the House and the Senate who serve in the House and the Senate need to recognize that we work for the American people.
10:40And we've got to serve the interests of the American people. That's the system that we inherit.
10:47And that's also why you've got judges who were given lifetime appointments so that they would be free of the political pressure that might otherwise accompany
10:58someone trying to act like the king who has the power to appoint but to get rid of a judge or, as in some instances, having a judge that has to seek re-election.
11:13That doesn't exist in our system and that's why we've seen some of the resilience, I think, at this moment.
11:19What are they doing in the House about this impeaching of judges? Can you mention that, President?
11:22Well, I think they've tried to move legislation to reduce the power of judges to be able to make the independent decisions that they are making right now,
11:34or the reach of those decisions, precisely because lawyers like Maya and others have had such success.
11:44We talked about this earlier. At this point, more than 200 different lawsuits have been filed.
11:49There's been a flood, the zone approach, right, with all of this unconstitutional and unlawful action and executive orders,
11:58but that's been met with a flood, an avalanche of righteous litigation.
12:03And the American people are winning in court, not losing.
12:07And because the American people are winning, Republicans in the House are trying to now change the rules, strip judges of jurisdiction.
12:16But let's be clear, we are not going to let it happen.
12:19So let me add that you're, and this is why Maya's incredible presence here is such an important reminder,
12:29that there are areas we have to fight. So the first thing, as you said, immediately, when he started pushing illegal executive orders,
12:38you all tied them up in court. And this is the amazing thing. Trump appointed judges. Obama appointed judges.
12:46Bush appointed judges. All across the board, you're seeing the judges step up and stop them, right?
12:52Yes.
12:53That's correct. These cases, and sometimes it's injunctions, but sometimes we're winning.
12:58Even the Supreme Court, which is three people on that court he put in place, have come out and have been stopping him from doing some of the things.
13:09The other arena is what you and I have to do. It is legislative, procedural, in every way possible.
13:16One of the reasons why I stood for 25 hours to say, what can I do to do things in this body with the levers we have,
13:23even though we're in the minority, in the levers we have.
13:26But the other arena we have to fight for is what you have said over and over again, is the power of the public.
13:33Because the power of the people in a democracy is greater than the people in power.
13:37And it is what our founders got right when they broke with the formation of governments all throughout history.
13:46This is not going to be because we all pray the same. We're not a theocracy.
13:50It's not going to be defined right of kings and queens because people are being this idea that we surrender our rights to a monarchy.
13:59It's not even going to be the power of the sword where people, through military strength, oppress the people, autocracies.
14:05We are going to form a democracy. And the debates at the time, powerfully written in the Federalist Papers,
14:14the arguments were that we were not going to concentrate power in any individual,
14:19but we were going to have three branches, co-equal branches of government.
14:23And what you see from President Trump so far is his willingness to immediately try to attack the powers of the other two branches.
14:32One, by saying, I'm going to move through the complicity of other Republicans in the House
14:39and do things that are not going to be questioned.
14:42Your job as Article 1 branch of the government, Congress, is to provide oversight.
14:46There's no hearings. Do not have a hearing about Elon Musk scraping data from people's personal data, their Social Security data, their tax data.
14:55Not one hearing about this unelected billionaire that's causing all this havoc.
14:59When we have scandals like SignalGate, not one hearing about whether this is the pattern in practice,
15:06which we're finding out that Hegseth is doing.
15:08We're going to eviscerate the power of the Article 1 branch to provide a check.
15:13And then, God forbid, if Article 3 branch is going to try to check my power, now I'm going to start threatening judges.
15:22Now I'm going to start saying things on my platforms that literally have had threats on judges increase over 100%.
15:30Literally, there's a judge in New Jersey who years ago, Judge Solis, years ago she had someone come to her house trying to murder her
15:42and instead murders her son and shoots and wounds her husband.
15:46Her son's name was Daniel Anderall.
15:49And then what he does, what's happening now through this whipping up of hate against people, judges, Republican-appointed judges,
15:58who are standing against the Trump administration, what's happening to now is now they are getting threatened as well.
16:05Literally, they're getting pizza sent to their private homes in the name of the murdered son of Judge Solis,
16:12that Daniel Anderall just sent you a pizza, to show, as if to threaten them, we know where you live.
16:20And so we're creating a context where democracies erode is when our norms and traditions begin to reduce and threats of violence rise.
16:29I've seen what they've done to some of my Senate colleagues, Republican colleagues who had dared to even question,
16:35should we be confirming Hegseth, the most unqualified Secretary of Defense, just by mentioning or questioning it,
16:42you're suddenly seeing them be dragged and threatened.
16:45And so what you see right now is the surrendering of power of checks and balances from the Article I branch of government.
16:51We are not doing oversight authority. We're not holding hearings.
16:55We're not allowing legislation that we've passed with the power of the pen, the power of the purse.
17:01That's being taken back by the executive with no accountability, no checks.
17:05And now they're attacking the Article III branch of government.
17:08This is a sign of autocracies, times of authoritarian leadership, not signs of democracies.
17:14This is the kind of things that are at stake right now.
17:17And the reason why we're asking people to come down here if you have the time.
17:21The day's gotten warm now. It's not as freezing as it was 6 o'clock in the morning when you and I were shaking, trying to look tough.
17:27We're not shaking anymore. The sun is climbing to its apex. It's almost midday.
17:32We've been out here. We're in our fourth hour of sitting here. We're thankful.
17:35The joggers have come and sat with us, just running through the plaza.
17:41They've decided to stop and stay. I'm so grateful for the runners making me feel guilty.
17:46Run home at the end of this, whatever time we stop.
17:49There are a lot of people out here on the plaza stopping.
17:52You want to come down, come and join us in this conversation.
17:55Come and join us. We're grounding ourselves in who are we?
17:58That question, the moral underpinnings. I saw a man with a collar. Hello, sir. Father, how are you?
18:04Pastor, it's good to see you. What's your name?
18:08Rev, Rev, then come sit behind us, Rev. Rev, come on, sit behind us, because you're going to bring us back to the faith traditions.
18:14We're talking about the moral underpinnings of this country. The founders were all about public virtue.
18:19They pulled from the great philosophers of the day about what it takes to build a good society.
18:24That's what's under assault. But the biggest immediacy that's under assault,
18:28that we want people who are watching this and streaming to go into the DMs, sneak up into Hakeem's DMs.
18:34Because sneak up, it's okay today. It's for religious purposes only.
18:41Sneak up into Hakeem's DMs. Sneak up into my DMs if you'd like to.
18:46And tell us your story. Tell us what motivates you. What's urgency? What are you afraid of?
18:52I see these women with these beautiful babies. Thank you for being here. Come on up here and sit there.
18:56We need more cuteness. With Hakeem and I here, we need more cuteness.
19:01Come on, sit right here in front of me. This is how politicians look good.
19:07It's put babies in the picture. But we want to hear from you today.
19:14We're going to sit here. We don't know how long we're going to sit here.
19:16But I imagine it's going to be as long as it's warm. The sun's going up, rising in the east.
19:21Coming up above the Capitol. Come here. Hi. Hi.
19:25But this is about our democracy. But the most urgency thing, and I think the thing that Hakeem,
19:29that you and I talked about why we're sitting here, is the urgency of a two-week break.
19:33Congress has been out and about. They've been holding town halls. They've been traveling the world.
19:38They've been going to El Salvador. We've seen heroic actions by Congress people all around.
19:43But now they're coming back. And the Republican leadership of this side of the Capitol, not the higher side.
19:49I think this is on an angle up there in the Senate, right? That's the higher side.
19:53What is the immediate threat? Don't push me here. I'm from Brooklyn.
19:59Close to the edge. There you go. That was Grandmaster Flash. He's actually from the Bronx.
20:08So I think we face this moment, as Corey indicated, where we will come back into session tomorrow
20:18and will be faced with an existential struggle to defeat a Republican effort to try to jam a very reckless budget down the throats of the American people,
20:29which is totally inconsistent with the approach that many of them spent all last year talking about,
20:35which was that they were going to try to drive down the high cost of living in the United States of America.
20:39They promised to lower costs. Costs aren't going down. They're going up.
20:43And we believe we have to build an affordable economy.
20:47That's what we should be working on, right, to make life better for everyday Americans.
20:51But instead, we've got a budget that's in front of us that is trying to enact the largest Medicaid cut in American history.
21:01It will hurt children, hurt families, hurt women, hurt seniors, hurt people with disabilities,
21:07closed hospitals, closed nursing homes.
21:12People will die if this budget is successful.
21:17That's how urgent the fight is.
21:20And we're going to stand on the side of the health care of the American people.
21:24And we need the American people to join us in this righteous struggle,
21:28because this budget is unacceptable, it's unconscionable, it's un-American,
21:35and we're going to do everything we need to bury it in the ground, never to rise again.
21:41Amen.
21:45Yo, Brooklyn.
21:48Brooklyn stole my nets. I want them back in Newark.
21:51I want them back in Newark.