and since then we've grown to be a national movement, a national grass roots movement. i believe that politics should work for the many, not the privileged few. what we do is we recruit and train grass roots activists, educators, organizers, union workers and every day americans to run and govern. we believe the people should governor, not corporations and the wealthy, and we work very hard with our activists around the country to make that. in fact, very recently over this past primary season, we've s elected eight working family democrats and democratic primaries that would bera goingo congress if they're successful in the general election. we think that's a pretty good record and that shows you our ideas are very, very popular across rural america, urban america, suburban america and every region in the country. >> working families and democrats, are you a traditional third party? >> we do have a ballot line in places that have voting like new york or connecticut that just allows to party to be able to course endorse the candidate of another party in certain places like that. we have our own battle line. in other places, we run our folks mainly in democratic primaries and look, let me explain what a party is. a party is a group of people that come together who have a set of issues, and use elections as the main intervention in order to advance that issue. as long as that's happening, as long as you're doing that, you're a party. so we show up in very different ways in order to advance our issues using elections. >> would you show up in a general election to run against a democratic candidate? >> because of the very rigid nature of the two-party system and one past the post of the electrical system, it creates a spoiler dilllemma where a minor -- dilemma and a minor party might send one candidate to a general election and might take votes from the candidate that's the closest to them and we don't believe in spoiler politics. there are opportunities where we absolutely will run in the general election and we have and we think there's a path to victory and we've proven that has happened and in some cases but we're very clear, there's two sides to struggle. the main side of struggle is the side of struggle where we're fighting against fascism. this is not hype boll ick. a -- hyperbolic. a political call captured the republican party and you're juneing with this area for people who identify add democrats, independents, and conservatives that believe in democracy to challenge the trumpist, maga republican party. the other side of struggle taking place in the democratic party is around how we ensure that americans can afford things like public education or could afford life saving drugs or could afford child care and that main debate is in the democratic party. >> on the latter side, what's been the impact in recent cycles? >> we've had a great track record and we have candidates up and down the ballot and hand indicates on the municipal level and around the country in congress. let's take congress for example. in texas, this is the south; right. this is not a postal elite bastion. they ran progressive candidates and unapologetic about their issues and they built broad coalitions and one end of primaries and likely to vote in congress. another person, summer lee in pittsburgh, pittsburgh is a working class town. summergh lee is a stall worth progressive that built a multiracial coalition that included union workers and included activists and many others and summer is likely to go to congress. jamie mccleod skinner in oregon, this is a raw district where she challenged a long-time incumbent. a long time incumbent as a democrat defied his own president and aligned with the pharmaceutical companies and when the democrats were trying to negotiate legislation in order for the federal government to be able to negotiate down thl prices of life saving down, he got in the way of that. jamie mccleod-skinner defeated this long term incumbent and running in the general election in oregon. >> we'd love you to join the conversation. phone lines, democrats 2,027,488,000 and special line for working families party members. (202)748-8003 is that number and maurice is with us till the bottom of the hour. if president bind decides to run for a second term, would you like to see him challenged in the democratic primary? >> well, so far there hasn't been any challenges that emerged and frankly what i'm focused on today is building the united front against what -- this is not hyperbole, what to me is u.s. fascism. i'm actually really heartened that president biden took such a strong stance against what he called the moderate republican party. >> talking about the philadelphia speech -- >> yeah, absolutely. because there really is a stark choice in this country and this is a important historical juncture for everybody listening. we are deciding whether or not we want to live in a democracy. we are deciding if we're comfortable with the political cult taking governing power. and people who identify as republicans, conservative, independent, progressive democrat have that very binary choice. it's freedom that's on the agenda. for that we've been in historically and it happened in a enforcement attempting to take over a democracy, and taking over democracy and the only thing that's succeeded in succeeding those is a united front. we are proudly part of a united front with anybody republican, democrat, independent, progressive, conservative, whoments to fight those forces and create a america where we all could prosper and we have the ability to have the debates and i want to have the debates around how we get to a place where we can afford child care or live in america where worker's rights are valued. if there are conservative ideas or independent ideas or democratic ideas, i want to live in a country where we can have that debate and we can't have it when we live in a country where political violence is becoming normalized. where the ideas of anti-democracy and we can nullify an election if we don't like the outcomes. >> johns up first out of independence, texas. good morning. >> good morning. i'm listening to mr. mitchell here and as an independent, just as an american, and i'm wondering how it is that trump is a cult and the democratic party is in a cult when they've already instituted socialism, they've flirted with communism, an you talk about fascism. we canan talk a lot about the democratic party and their neofascist views so why is it that you wanted to bringng the country together yet you want t take this extreme side -- >> thank you, caller. what i mean is when the former president said he could go in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot somebody and his audience and following would support him -- would praise him. that is a cult-like dedication to a leader not to a value and i think the republican party moved very danielously in this j value -- dangerously in that value. i would probably join you in a lot of the critiques but it simply isn't true that there is a personality cult and we all need to get together to top is that thanksgiving and the debate the caller i think wants to have, i want to have that debate with thehe caller and people i disagree with. i believe thatle people who i disagree with and this is what progressives believe. people who we disagree with should be able to afford healthcare and should be able to live in safe communities and should be invested in when they're at the workplace and they should be able to organize it if they want to. we should be in the society where our values and our ideas can't lead to political violence and we saw it january 6, we have seen a lot of far right violence, political organize so we know this is cult-like behavior and i want to be very clear that i'm not taking any issue with people who have conservative views around this issue of fundamental democracies and i disagree with what the -- we can disagree with the issues if you don't live in a area where we can struggle around ideas too. after this we're going to the white house to celebrate with president biden and the enactment of the ira and when the inflation reduction act passed the senate a month ago. i expressed this would signal a turning point in our country's fight to lower costs, to meet our nation's climate challenges and usher in a new era of affordable, cheaper, cleaner energy. now a month later, the good news is already pouring in. companies have announced billions and billions of dollars in new investments here in america to start manufacturing batteries for electric and hybrid vehicles. it drives home the belief that good policy is also good politics. when you pass good legislation, you get results. it's been a long time since the american people have felt that washington's capable of doing big things to meet challenges. our members are taking that message home and it'll drive america forward and new jobs and good paying jobs and jobs with a future and not a job you think after five years will be eliminated and it'll all grow. americans will every walk of life and they are seeing the contrast and one what are the maga republicans doing? a nationwide abortion band. that's the contrast between the two parties play plain and simple and patty will talk more about the legislation in a moment. republicans are twisting everything into a pretzel on abortion and let me be clear. again, what senator graham is introduce asking a maga nation-wide abortion ban. if it walks like a nation-wide abortion ban and talked like a nation-wide abortion ban, it is a nation-wide abortion ban. that's the contrast and the split screen is un-mus takeable for -- unmistakable for all americans to see for themselves. we're focused on inflation fighting and they're focused on extreme agenda that hurts women. let me turn it over to patty. >> thanks, mr. leader. today republicans introduce add national abortion ban and we're sending clear message of people across the country and republicans want to take away your rights. republicans want to ban in abortion in every state and every community and republicans want to force you to stay pregnant regardless of what you want, regardless of your circumstances, regardless of your medical needs, regardless of what state you are in. red state, blue state, doesn't matter. did you vote against a abortion ban in your state like the people of kansas? did you just sign a petition for referendum vote to protect abortion like hundreds of thousands of people did in michigan? do you live in a state lake like washington that has strong protection to the right for abortion? doesn't matter. this bill would rip away those rights. now for weeks we have seen a lot of empty rhetoric from republicans about returning this issue to the state. even as they blocked the most basic bills we've tried to pass like trying to make sure people could travel to other states for care and making sure doctors in states where abortion is legal can't be punished for doing their job. but now after all the posturing and all the objecting, here we have it, the true republican position. in black and white for everyone to see. they want to ban abortion for everyone in every single state. so to anyone who thought they were safe, who thought i'm in a blue state, i'll be fine, here is the painful reality. republicans are come afterring your rights. we have already seen the devastation and the healthcare crisises these extreme abortion bans have caused. patients who are unable to get a prescription filled, doctors who are unsure if they can do their job forced to wait until patients get sicker, until their lives are in danger before they can take action. that's what we are seeing in republican states right now, and it is a nightmare they now want to impose on every single corner of our country. instead of seeing how disastrous and dangerous and deadly these bans can be instead of acknowledging how widely unpopular they are as we saw in kansas, republicans are intent on ripping away the rights of people in my state and other state withs a national abortion ban. it is chilling. republicans care more about their extremism than your healthcare or your rights or your life. republicans may not know a thing about your circumstances. they may not know what your health is like, they may know not your family plans. they may not know your hopes, your fears, or plans for the future but they sure seem to think they know better when it comes to your body. this is horrifying. i have been fighting against extreme abortion policies since i first got into politics. i will not stop now or ever. as long as republicans are going after my constituent's rights, as long as they're going after women's bodies and our futures, they're going to hear from me and all of my colleagues. they're going to hear from women, they're going to hear from men across the country. they are going to be held accountable. >> thank you, mr. leader and let me turn again to the issue of results. it took a decade of work to transform the tax code and we are seeing results and clean energy in a matter of weeks. let me walk you through a few of the places, the toyota battery and ev factory in north carolina, a honda and lg energy solution battery factory. piedmont lithium manufacturing factory in tennessee. another first solar factory to build solar panels and a sparks battery plant in west virginia. that's on the jobs side. let's talk about the consumer side. families in a position to lower their utility bills increasing efficiency so their homes use less energy and powering their homes with cleaner renewable energy for sources and the fact is the tax credit in a number of you have been asking about that, they kick in in january so the point is in a matter of a few weeks, you are going to see homeowners as well as businesses benefit. the bottom line is what we set out to do years ago. that is to show that averting the climate catastrophe while creating good paying jobs and lowering cost to consumers, they're not mutually exclusive. we can do both. that's the democratic record of actual producing results and producing them now. >> thank you, senator wyden. >> lindsey graham's bill is yet another exam it will how out of touch the republicans are with issues that really matter to the american people. so focusing on the inflation reduction act and lowering of prescription drug costs, they're about close to 300,000 seniors in hey who rely on medicare and lowering prescription drug costs in medicare and enabling us to negotiate this cost is something that so many of us are here with the affordable care act being first enacted and something we've been pushing for for over so years and it -- 10 years and took us that long for this life to negotiate and it's the largest healthcare system in our country has been doing for decades and also capping out of pocket costs for seniors at $2,000 and it'll enable over a million seniors in our country to have those costs capped and one thing that will make a difference to so many seniors right now is that those seniors to get their vaccinations free and especially for example shingles vaccine, one out of three older americans are affected by shingles and a lot don't get the vaccine because they have to pay for it. no longer and there happens to be a bill i've been pushing for a lot of years so this goes to show as we have been saying that the democrats have been saying that we are the party that's been doing things that really enable lowering of drug costs, fighting climate change was not a single republican vote. there's a huge difference between what we care about and what they focus on. >> thank you. questions? >> [inaudible]. a >> bottom line is we're urging both sides to come together and come to an agreement period. >> were you surprised by potential problems about the mansion agreement here with progressives and liberals concerned about the environment? >> the bottom line is very simple, the permitting agreement is part of the ira agreement. i'll add to the cr and it'll pass. i answer that had question, next. senators baldwin and cinema are working with republican senators to try and get the ten votes we need. we very much like to bring it up and vote on it. they're working with republicans. you'll have to ask a lot of the republican senators where they're at. our plan, our hope is to bring it up and have it voted on very soon. we're still negotiating where it'll start. it's very simple and you want to protect the rights to see to vote for more democratic senators and you want to keep the -- you want to have a nationwide abortion ban. vote for maga republicans. plain and simple. last one. my view is that maggie hasson has done a great job and no matter who wins the primary, she'll win the election in november. thank you, everybody. sorry, we have to hurry. >> the senate returns at 2:15 eastern to continue working on judicial nominations. early today, south carolina republican senator lindsey graham introduced legislation to ban abortion after 15 weeks nationwide and held a news conference on capitol hill on that bill and took questions from reporters. >>