but the number of veterans in office has fallen dramatically over the years, and it s now just down to 20%. our nation s veterans are an important civic asset with skills and experience far beyond their years. so what are they doing to keep serving their country? joining me again, congresswoman and army captain tulsi gabbard, who served two tours in operation iraqi freedom and was just named one of elle magazine s ten most powerful women in d.c. congratulations. and john sultz, another two-tour iraq war veteran and co-founder and chairman of vote vets. congresswoman, you know, you re a bit of a prodigy in public office. you were elected to the hawaii legislature at age 21. u.s. congress at age 31. how did your military experience play a role in that? i ve got to tell you, i m getting a lot of flak from many of my soldier friends who saw that elle magazine article. they remember me in a very
take. joining me now, chairman of vote vets and adam green, co-founder of the progressive change committee. thanks to you both. i want to start with you, adam. did you ever think you would find yourself agreeing with sarah palin? maybe not sarah palin. we have had some weird bedfellows on the nsa wiretapping, issues. but when you have the overwhelming majority of americans agreeing the president s doigs kick this to congress but disagreeing with the idea that we need to bomb syria as the only option. that brings a lot of people together including those on the left and the right. have you pulled your members and got a very strong response? walk the about that a little bit. we wanted to see what our members wrthing. for 72 hour, we did an intense survey of our national membership. folk in every state, every congressional district. at the end of the day, by 73%, to 18%, they said do not bomb
on this base. but the realities of that and the realities of the sequester. costing a lot of members of the military across the country creating new challenges for those families. we anticipate he will not focus on those political elements, focus specifically on the individuals, their personal sacrifices and hopefully leave here by just leaving them with a message of thanks. all right, peter. please stay with us. let s bring into the conferring now john sultz, iraq war veteran, co-founder and chairman of the group vote vets. john, what are you hoping as a veteran yourself, what are you hoping to hear from the president today? well, i hope he says thank you. you know, it s really important at camp pendleton. it s where the first marine expeditionary force is. it s one of the most deemployable installations in the country. if no president has visited there since 2004, it s great to sit down with these troops who are always influx.
first, this organization is not just a group of navy s.e.a.l.s. this is a group of former he s correct. they actually have a general in the organization who believes osama bin laden wasn t born i mean they actually believe. there s a birther who believes the president of the united states wasn t born in america. go on, mr. gomez. i haven t interrupted jon when he spoke. you haven t. go ahead. i would like to continue on with what i was saying. this group has a large number of former army, navy, air force, marines personnel. a large number of intelligence personnel. it s very eclectic group. you can t bucket just one group into a certain political party. i would argue that jon s group isn t just one party. it s vote vets. we have 220,000 members which is probably more than what you have. come on. let him finish. i m sure they re not just in one political party. so ours has an eclectic group.
happened in pakistan. where am i wrong? well, i d like to go back to a couple of things jon said. first, this organization, opsec, is not just a group of navy s.e.a.l.s. and they have a general who believes osama bin laden, they believe was a birther in this video that believed that the president of the united states wasn t born in america. 9/11, you know i haven t interrupted. you haven t. go ahead. this group has a large number of former army, navy, air force, marines, essentispecial operati personnel. you can t bucket just one group into a certain political party. i would argue jon s group isn t just one political party. it s vote vets. we have 220,000 members.