Pete Aguilar (00:00):
Republicans in Congress don't care if your healthcare is too expensive, and they don't care if you can't afford your medical bills. They voted for what Elon Musk called a, "Disgusting abomination," a Republican budget that throws millions of Americans off of their health insurance. Republicans don't care if their tariffs are raising your prices across the board and making it harder to make ends meet. They voted to take away food assistance for families, seniors, veterans, and they'll continue to reward billionaire donors who keep them in office with tax breaks so they can hold onto power. They're getting rich off of the stock trades, while working people worry about losing their jobs. When confronted with the truth, they often just lie or they show their true colors, like one Republican senator did by dismissing concerns that Medicaid cuts might lead to unnecessary deaths as a result of their disgusting abomination, kicking millions off of their healthcare. "We're all going to die," she said. That is the Republican healthcare plan in a nutshell, and that's why Republicans can't be trusted to make your healthcare or anything else more affordable for working families. Vice Chair Ted Lieu.
Ted Lieu (01:27):
Thank you, Chairman Aguilar. I also condemn the horrific terrorist attack in Boulder, Colorado. About a dozen people were burned, some critically, because of a terrorist who threw essentially Molotov cocktails at a group of Jewish Americans. And let me just be clear, Hamas is a genocidal, homicidal, extreme terrorist organization who attacked Israel, not the other way around. And now, Jewish Americans in America are fearing for their safety because of folks who are committing brazen acts of anti-Semitism. We need to call it out when we see it. And I urge that the person be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law who committed this heinous terrorist attack.
(02:15)
I'd like to now talk about Senator Joni Ernst's statement, that, "We all are going to die." She is correct, that we all are going to die, but it shouldn't be at the hands of Republican legislation, and the Republican's big, ugly bill is going to cause unnecessary death. So then, Senator Ernst doubled down on her statement and did a video of herself walking through a cemetery, again, talking about what she said, and then she ended by citing Jesus. So I'm just a simple Catholic, but let me just tell you, I actually read the gospels, and Jesus goes around healing people, that's what he does. He heals a woman who was blind, he heals a person who had leprosy, he heals a person who was paralyzed, 41 acts of healing in the gospels, that's what Jesus did in terms of acts. So it's exactly the opposite of what Senator Ernst is saying, and call me old-fashioned, but I think the goal of government is not to hasten the deaths of Americans, it's to make the lives of Americans better. And clearly, this big, ugly bill is not going to do that.
(03:27)
And now, we see some Republican members who are opposed to it, because guess what? They didn't read the bill. So Marjorie Taylor Greene yesterday opposes a provision which is a 10-year moratorium on states regulating artificial intelligence. So I agree with Marjorie Taylor Greene once every 100 years, this is that time. I agree that this 10-year provision is extreme, it's going to cause unnecessary harm. And look, I think the federal government's fine doing preemption when we preempt with something, you can't just preempt with nothing. And this is a bad provision, and I hope the Senate will take out this 10-year moratorium.
Pete Aguilar (04:12):
Thank you, Ted. Questions?
Speaker 3 (04:15):
A couple of your ranking members, Congressman Craig and Congressman Richard Murphy, as well as some fairly senior members, are leaving the House to run for higher office. I'm just curious if you see this as an opportunity for any seat change in the House or just opportunities for admission for House members who maybe haven't had them.
Pete Aguilar (04:35):
I think Vice Chair Lieu and I have had the privilege of serving with a lot of members who have moved on to other jobs within public service, whether that's our former colleague, the attorney general, Xavier Becerra, to Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, members are going to seek opportunities to serve their constituents in different ways. That's the blessing of being a House member is folks will take opportunities.
(05:05)
And then, last cycle, obviously we saw different opportunities, with now-Senator Andy Kim and Senator Gallego, Senator Slotkin, Lisa Blunt Rochester, all coming from the House. We take a lot of pride in that, the fact that we have some friends over there who used to be House members. So we take it as an opportunity for renewal, to hear from the perspectives of new members, those new members who replaced our former colleagues. But then personally, it's a point of pride that we now have the ability to bounce ideas off of folks in the other chamber. I said other chamber, not upper chamber, by the way, when we talk about the US Senate. So this is an opportunity for us to continue to benefit from new ideas of those new members and build on existing relationships for those folks who have moved on to other jobs.
(06:05)
Mike?
Mike (06:06):
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There's a debate in the Senate right now over Russia's sanctions package. Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal were trying to push [inaudible 00:06:16] to bring that particular bill to the floor. I wanted to get the caucus's thoughts on imposing additional sanctions on Russia. And what do you make of the President's shift in tone towards Vladimir Putin? He's put out some recent Truth Social posts saying that he's surprised by Putin's unwillingness to engage in good faith peace talks. I want to get your thoughts on that.
Pete Aguilar (06:42):
I think many of us in Capitol Hill warned him in dealing with Vladimir Putin, and I think that you're seeing that now. This seems like the upside-down, Donald Trump's former friends, Vladimir Putin and Elon Musk, are now not besties. I can't keep track of it anymore. But Russia is a threat. We have voted for sanctions for Russia previously. We continue to view it through the lens of national security, and we will be willing and ready to make deliberations and votes if there are packages and proposals. But I think right now, the effort that the Senate is undertaking is more of an effort to get Donald Trump to be supportive of Russian sanctions than it is to get the House of Representatives to be supportive of Russian sanctions. They clearly are trying to work Donald Trump to get to this position, and we'll see what happens in the weeks to come.
Ted Lieu (07:44):
Thank you. Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said that Ukraine is a part of Russia, and Putin attacked Ukraine, Crimea, and then when there was not a good response from the West, he attacked again Ukraine a second time, and my view is Putin will not stop until his troops are defeated on the battlefield. And I urge the Trump administration to understand that fact, and I believe the best way to get Putin to the negotiating table is to apply maximum pressure in terms of sanctions, give Ukraine what they need to defeat Russian troops on the battlefield, and then we'll get Putin to the negotiating table.
Pete Aguilar (08:27):
Nick?
Nick (08:27):
There's a number of your members who are speaking at this WelcomeFest this week [inaudible 00:08:34] types, is it helpful to your party trying to come together for these folks to be going so far out on an ideological limb?
Pete Aguilar (08:41):
It's helpful for members of our party to meet with outside voices, to talk about an agenda that puts working families first, and that's how I viewed those discussions, which is what is our strategy as a party to put working families first, how do we lower the costs that people face? Clearly, we are united against this one ugly bill that House Republicans passed that is now over in the Senate, and we will clearly work on different items to lower the costs that people face. We've talked often about those, child tax credit, low-income housing credit, all of these pieces that are so instrumental in helping working families get forward. So I think that that's always important to huddle with colleagues and friends and stakeholders to make sure that we're on the same page, and that's how I viewed the conference, but I wasn't there.
Speaker 6 (09:43):
Thanks, Mr. Chairman. The Republicans were just in here, they blamed Democrats and immigration policies for the attack in Boulder, specifically because this individual was here illegally. Do you wish that Democrats, over the last four years, had handled the immigration issue differently?
Pete Aguilar (10:06):
I think right now, we're thinking about the 12 people who have injuries as a result of the attack. I'm sure there will be opportunities to dig deeper on the status of the individual who perpetrated this heinous act. I don't think it was hours before Republicans were already sounding the alarm about immigration policies, closely tying it to this attack. There'll be opportunities to dig deeper in his status. Obviously, we believe that it's not okay to overstay a visa. But let's understand the facts before we make declarations, and let's think about the folks, including one or two that are in critical condition, before we start injecting the Republican talking points on the political side. Go ahead, yeah.
Speaker 7 (11:04):
Thank you. So coming up, you have the oversight ranking member race, that's going to be a big deal in the Democratic caucus, and it's another pivotal moment for the party to determine who's going to be the next leader of this powerful committee, and whether they go with somebody younger who's eager and has a lot of energy versus someone who has a lot of experience, and I know you've talked before about the caucus weighing up several different things when you're picking a new member. What are things that the caucus is going to be looking at, and what do you think should be the quality of the next ranking member?
Pete Aguilar (11:33):
The caucus will have the opportunity to weigh that and vote. The vice chair and I notice the election for three weeks from now at our regularly scheduled caucus meetings. Our expectation is that the four candidates will make their way to meet with members, and will give them ample opportunity to do that. I think any member will view that race through the lens of experience, willingness to do the hard work of oversight, the important portfolio that oversight contains within the federal workforce, I think is also incredibly important. As we've said before, seniority and length of tenure is always a factor, but it is one of many factors that members consider. And members will arrive at their own decisions and make a pick for the ranking member position, that's our expectation. The vice chair and I are tasked with presiding over the election, so our job is to just make sure that it's done in a fair way and to make sure that the members hear directly from the candidates.
Ted Lieu (12:42):
I just want to say something.
Pete Aguilar (12:43):
Yeah.
Ted Lieu (12:45):
I just want to say that just because someone's a senior member, it doesn't mean they have less energy. One point of fact, Speaker Pelosi had and continues to have more energy than most human beings that I know.
Pete Aguilar (13:01):
Thank you.
Speaker 8 (13:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 9 (13:03):
Thanks.
