Transcripts For CSPAN2 Democratic Attorneys General Discuss

Transcripts For CSPAN2 Democratic Attorneys General Discuss Racial Inequity 20240712

On this stuff. You all remember you are watching this that you had a bunch of folks showing up at the State Capitol with guns because governor was trying to protect people from covid well we are proud of her. Oh yeah, i wish we have so many more voices here but, as you can see, the role of the attorney general, expansive sony things and as soon as you said republicans are trying to entice covid we are seeing a shout outs, we need an attorney general in texas and in florida. We know and we need you to help us with that. I do want to switch gears a little bit. I want to talk about daca and what general becerra has done out in california. You lead the fight to protect the daca program from trump and the chance to illuminate it entirely. Can you share why this fight is so important to you . It is to me. But it also appears that this has been a [inaudible] continuing on their attack on dreamers. What steps come next to preserve the daca program . For me this was a very personal case, being the son of an immigrant, but more than that, because the dreamers have been so courageous. Their motto is undocumented and unafraid. When you put yourself out there in the public and say i dont have papers, you know what you are facing. To still do that, there arent too many people who are more courageous than that. So theres no reason why we cant be as courageous, unafraid as they are. And so when we took on the case, and every one of us who is on this chat was part of the effort because it was a nationwide effort by coalitions all around, not just ags even, it was just a coalition all around. We had one goal in mind, and that is to let these kids who are american stay american. And so while most people thought it was an uphill battle, i remember after our team had come out of the Supreme Court on the argument, i had a whole bunch of folks say to me, gee, that was tough, you know, you gave it a college try. I said, you know, dont give up hope on this. Dont give up hope. And at the end of the day, i believe the reason we won is because we believe in the rule of law. We believe that a government that puts something out there for its people and has people rely on it to their detriment doesnt just yank something away. Youve got go through a process. Even an executive order, which isnt a law, maybe one president can establish an executive order and the next president can yank it away, but you just cant yank it as if nothing was involved. That was the case we tried to make. Fortunately, enough justices in the Supreme Court felt that same way, and now our fight continues because now weve got an administration that isnt willing to accept a Supreme Court decision and is now trying to dismantle daca through other means, and so were going to do everything we can to make sure this administration to its very last day, thank god hopefully we can all say january 19th will be his last day, we will make sure that the daca students, the dreamers continue to make that American Dream a reality. Thanks to everybody not just my colleagues who are on this call, but everybody who came to stand up for the dreamers who dont have the rights to stand up for themselves. Yeah, and i think this one is also super personal because i will be honest here, i cried when the decision was made, and so here to stay for all immigrants and for the latino community, at least for me, thank you, and to our ags, really meaningful. To the ags i do want to lets talk about aca, the Affordable Care act and whats happening there. As you are all well aware, the Trump Administration and 18 Republican Ags are asking the Supreme Court to strike down the Affordable Care act, calling the entire law unconstitutional. The coalition of democratic ags, which ag becerra again has been leading have fought back every step of the way. Can we discuss why this lawsuit is so critically important especially during this unprecedented covid pandemic . So ag, i see you nodding a lot. We will start with you. It was special because javier, being the good man he is, literally the friday before i took office, he said so join me on this conference call. Were announcing our case that now to the Supreme Court and this goes to my background which is in constitutional law. I want to first say back to the rule of law point that javier said it is surreal that were litigating this case. The theory that the Justice Department has was basically just rejected in a Supreme Court case. It involves severability which is you dont knock down a whole statute because a part of it might be unconstitutional. In the face of that principle, all these republican attorneys general and the doj have basically said we dont care. We are going to seek to end healthcare for millions of americans. In colorado 400,000 people have healthcare because of the medicaid expansion. And 700,000 people have protection from discrimination because of the protections from those who have preexisting conditions, who otherwise might get discriminated against. Were in a pandemic, and this administration is still trying to take away healthcare, making what i think is a surreal argument. In the face of that, the democratic ags and i want to note two brave Republican Ags who are defending the rule of law are standing up for whats a core principle, which is laws get passed in this country, we expect them to be followed including by the president and the administration. I believe just like what javier said, that principle will be vindicated next year, like we have indicated the principle we need a fair and constitutional census, just like we made clear that the dreamers have to be treated lawfully and fairly, now it is about healthcare and the Affordable Care act. We are seeing a test f of our institution and testing of the rule of law. I often say the rule of law is on the ballot this fall, obviously the race for president , but also the race for attorneys general and District Attorney. We need to be a nation committed to the rule of law, just governance. Im so proud to work with these great leaders to do just that. I do want to open up the floor. Either of the ags, if one of you feels like you want to jump in first and continue off the great things that ag weiser said. Phil was pretty good on that one. [laughter] during a pandemic, i want to say that these we do have races coming up, and we will talk about as we have kind of mentioned here. We have Republican Ags who are consistently and will at no cost not even during a pandemic, they are trying to take away healthcare from thousands across the country, and so Pay Attention to the elections and whats coming up. I see a lot of chatter here about who their attorneys general are, and so im glad you guys are paying attention, but Pay Attention to what they are doing. Some of them of the Republican Ags are even under indictment. Take a look. But ag healy or ag becerra, did you have anything else you wanted to add to that . Yeah, you know, these are really important fights, and its really frustrating when you see republican governors and Republican Ags and states encouraging people not to wear masks. They are the same states where they have fought to take away healthcare from people, and now in the crisis that were in, their numbers have only gone up because of the irresponsible action and resources that weve needed frankly in the northeast have now been diverted there, which you know is appropriate on some level but so unnecessary. Every day we battle these guys. Every day it is about protecting people, standing up for people. Healthcare is a fundamental building block. You know, i just i really i cant add to anything that either phil or javier said, except to underscore i think for all of us you know we do these jobs because we understand the profound humanity in this work and the need to be there. Whether its a bunch of us you know, a bunch of us were down on the border two years ago as we were fighting family separation. Our very first action together as democratic ags was to take on the travel ban, the muslim ban. You know, its been great to hang with everybody through this. Im hoping that, you know, come november we will see less action against the federal government, but we certainly have had our muscles tested, and, you know, i think have i mean, thats one thing. Folks probably dont know this, weve won over 90 of our cases against the Trump Administration in the courts, stopping bad things from happening, whether it was on rollbacks of environmental regulations or, you know, Consumer Protection actions, you name it, and thats a record, you know, to be proud of. Farah i will add a couple of things. The attacks on the Affordable Care act arent just a straight direct assault thats now before the Supreme Court. The Trump Administration has been trying to essentially pick apart the Affordable Care act for the last three and a half years. They have tried to stop women from exercising their rights to reproductive care, and we fought them on that. They came up with a rule that said there should be religious exemptions for providers that could refuse to provide services not just to women by the way, could be an lgbtq person, if they dont like the way they behave or what their status is, you can almost for any reason, so long as you say religiously i dont want to provide this Person Services under the trump proposed rule, they could have denied a woman, lgbtq, immigrant services, and so we fought that. We were successful in most of the cases to protect a womans right to have access to services. They tried to come up with a rule that said that you had to split only for abortion care the cost in your Insurance Plan between all your other Healthcare Services that you get and abortion. And so what they were trying to do is by the way, even if the charge for that additional plan for Abortion Services was one penny, you still had to have them segregated which means for a lot of people they would fail to get the second plan or forget one month to pay the plan and they would lose it. It was ridiculous what they were doing. They have been attacking healthcare, more than just the assault on the Affordable Care act. For 133 Million People who have a preexisting medical condition, donald trump says he will protect them through an executive order. He doesnt need to do that. Thats already protected in the Affordable Care act. He needs to stop trying to dismantle the entire Affordable Care act. It is a very callous, devious and harmful game that this administration has played in playing with the rule of law. And thats why were standing up. Yeah, this is keith here. I will just dive in and say that everything my colleague said is spot on exactly right, but, you know, its a good time to just remind everybody that yes, congressional races are important. Absolutely we agree with that. And yes the president ial race is very important. But there are a whole bunch of other races that are absolutely essential to your quality of life. Ag is one of them so are District Attorney races and prosecutor races. These are critical, and we need the nation to plug in. I will also Say Something that xavier mentioned thats not exactly on aca but its related and thats this where historically the freedom of religion was that the state could not discriminate against you based on your religion. They are changing this doctrine to say that an individual business can discriminate against people because of who they are. Somehow it is a front to hobby lobby to provide equal access to Reproductive Healthcare to women. Somehow its an affront to some videographer to require that they serve the public equally and that they will not be able to say that were going to deny services to a same sex couple who wants to get married. Theyre literally using the doctrine of freedom of faith, freedom of religion to discriminate against people. These people who called for a muslim ban also want to say that a company can fire you because youre transgender, deny you service because you will have a same sex wedding, deny you Service Healthcare because you want reproductive services. This is a critical fight for the public, and i will say even by extension, yes, you need to be plugged into ag races but we need to win the u. S. Senate because trump is trying to load up the judiciary with the most outrageous right wingers that you have ever seen, and just for scale, understand that obama got about 95 people in the federal judiciary. Trump has gotten nearly 200 in half the time. They are trying to blot out the rights of workers, civil rights, through the judiciary, and who is your advocate there . Well, thats us. It is also the judges who will tell the story. Thats why these cases i mean, these races are critical for your attention. Thats why we need you to plug in and help us win these races. Thank you, i do want to make sure we make time for elections, and then before we jump to questions, and so, folks, if you have questions, please click on the q a at the bottom of the screen and feel free to ask there so we can get to it. But weve talked a lot about a lot of issues, but i do want to talk about our 2020 elections. Ags actually have elections every year, and so turning to our 2020 election in just a few months, what are we, 82 days, 80ish days we have ten races this year where people will directly elect their state ag. We have really great opportunities to flip some red states blue, such as montana and indiana. Since all of you have campaigned before, whats one thing you have learned while out on the trail thats important in ag campaigns and what makes for a great state ag . Ag healy . You know, i think so much of it is the people business, and you got to be out there. I dont listen to any polls. Im not looking at the polls right now. I dont believe much in polls. So, you know, for me prior to law school, i had a basketball career, and, you know, my view is always play like youre behind, and you play right to the clock. I think thats the mentality that we need to win these races, take nothing for granted. And also, you know, as ive learned in my state, people think of massachusetts as very blue, well, you know, we had yes 2 million hillary voters but we had over a million trump voters, you know . I think within our state, we recognize as state ags that there are people, you know, of all different parties, but theres a lot of commonality, if you find a way to connect with them, get a chance to make your chase. Thats why i love being a state ag and being able to be out there that way. Im just emphasizing that, you know, you cant do enough or work hard enough to win races, and grassroots matter. Ive learned endorsements now that ive been elected, it is not to say that candidates dont want endorsements but it is the power of the people. Thats what builds movements and wins elections, and thats why im so proud of the democratic attorneys general association really, you know, for bringing it the last few years thats brought in this amazing class of colleagues out there who are truly representative of the people in the communities that we serve. I will jump in. Lets see, ag weiser, we flipped your state in 2018. Lets hear from you. I want to say this group has been great about being a team and with real mentorship, as well as former ags. I will Say Something that i learned from maura, also first time candidate, it is important to educate people about why ags matter. All of you who are on this zoom call, you have a sense of why ags matter, what an impactful position, please, spread the word, focus on these races. They should not be overlooked. I use the phrase that i know others have used which is were the peoples lawyer. We protect the civil rights, the consumer rights, equal rights, and thats something that i made clear throughout my campaign. Another thing, and predecessor here in colorado, i traveled everywhere, every single county in my state, 64 counties. You show up and listen. Just like maura says, grassroots, you respect people. I dont care who you voted for for president. I dont care if you are going to vote for me or not. If you are going to show up, i respect you. I want to listen to you. You have to keep showing up and building relationships because whats been said, it is so true, we are close to people. We are the peoples lawyer. We show up. We listen. Its something that teachers will tell you. No one cares how much you know until they know how much you care. By showing up and by caring about communities and working with them, you can build relationships. You can build trust. And right now were living in a time with less trust in our Public Officials than ever before. I will tell you, one of our goals as state ag to build that trust, to show people we are fighting for them, and im proud of how all the leaders on this call embody that spirit in a palpable way. Could i just mention quickly that a few years ago the democratic ags had a halftime executive director, now we have a full, and we have a much bigger stronger team. We went from being housed, you know, i think we were in colorado to washington. The fact is we have gotten very serious about electing dem ags. Quite frankly, the republicans were kind of ahead of us, they really geared up their operation before we did. You know, look, Netroots Nation, just because somebody has better ideas doesnt mean they are going to win. We need you to help out and to pitch in and to make thes

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