Right Now With Perry Bacon. You can watch this interview here.
But it’s important to understand the mechanics of this moment and how we got to a shutdown, because there’s a lot of misinformation and misreporting. And that’s by intention, because the Republicans are masters at creating elaborate smokescreens to basically make the public think something else is happening. It’s very much a sleight of hand.
And so it’s important to understand that the House is completely shut down right now. If you go back to your basic civics—how a bill becomes a law—you have to pass a bill in the House and the Senate. It has to come together, and then it has to get signed by the president. Well, the House is not even open right now.
So for the Republicans to claim that somehow we’re responsible for a shutdown is literally insane, because Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House, shut down the House. There are no Republican members of Congress even in Washington, D.C. right now. So the sleight of hand they’re doing is this: the Senate is forcing votes on a bill over and over again that we already said no to. They’re trying to make it look like they’re passing a bill when, in fact, they’re not even engaging in good-faith negotiations. So it’s a big thing.
So, for example, I used to be on the marketplace—I’m still on the marketplace as a member of Congress, in fact. You pay your premiums through the marketplace. If your premiums are currently like $300, $400 a month, which is still a lot of money for health insurance, you’re about to see a notice from your health insurance company starting today—literally today—that says your health insurance is going to be jacked up by hundreds of dollars. And so if you’re a working family, you cannot afford your health insurance.
So basically what they’re trying to do is take away the subsidies that made it possible for working people to afford health insurance. In other words, they’re trying to take us back before the Affordable Care Act. They’re literally trying to destroy the Affordable Care Act.
So our bill that we have put forward would continue those subsidies so that working people can pay for health insurance if they’re on the exchange and would fix the Medicaid cuts that literally will kick millions of Americans off of health care. And this is necessary not only so that you don’t lose your health insurance in a month, but also so that our health care system doesn’t collapse.
So, in New Mexico, we already have a health care system that is severely strained, and hospitals, rural clinics are already trying to figure out how they’re going to stay open. This is about saving the American health care system and making sure that literally people’s lives can have access to basic health care.
But the Republicans aren’t even negotiating. They are pretending like they are, but they’re not. They’re not even physically here in Washington, D.C. And then they’re going on TV and telling the American people that we’re advocating to give health care for free to people who don’t have citizenship. I mean, we are being gaslit by the Republicans right now.
But the bigger issues—the issues of our democracy, the rule of law, the invasion of American cities—all those things are certainly at play. But there are different times and spaces where those battles are being fought.
But is there any moment where you are going to lead on the other issues, which we seem to be kind of putting to the side, even in this? It’s like, well, you don’t have a lot of leverage here. This is one of the leverage points.
Do you want to use that to ask for the law to be followed on other policies?
And so, for example, in Chicago, the governor of Illinois has said, if you come in here, we’re going to sue your ass. And so you better not send those troops here. And the president pulled back. Now, he still is planning to deploy some federal law enforcement to Chicago, but he significantly scaled back what he was planning to do, which was like a full-scale troop deployment like they did in L.A., because the governor of California sued in L.A., and the courts found it was illegal.
So when you say, how are we going to fight back? We are fighting back. But you’ve got to fight back in the right venue.
And the problem is that our Republican colleagues seemingly don’t have a backbone anymore and seemingly don’t care about using their congressional authority to hold these guys in check. And so, sure, right now they’re going to start another vote in the Senate over the Republican C.R. The Republicans are trying to peel off five more Democratic members basically to pass their bill.
So at this point, the House is like, screw you. We’re not going to pass anything. We already voted against this. We are one hundred percent unified. But we don’t have the power in this situation. And that’s frankly why Mike Johnson has shut down the House, because he’s basically saying House Democrats are irrelevant since they don’t have the majority. But in the Senate, they need Democrats.
And so we have been advocating, working alongside, with leadership coordinating to make sure our Senate Democrats don’t fold. But, you know, the Senate is its own beast.
But yes, the question about the misappropriation of funds, the cutting of programs, the federal firings—all of those things are already illegal. So we can insist that they make them illegal again in these appropriations bills, but it doesn’t change the dynamic. Do you see what I’m saying?
So, you know, I think we face a really consequential Sophie’s choice when it comes to government shutdowns. It’s not like, OK, sure, shut the whole thing down and everything’s going to be fine because they can’t do what they want. Number one, they are going to do what they want. Russell Vought is literally talking to Republicans as we speak right now and telling them that he plans to mass fire hundreds of thousands of Americans.
Well, that’s illegal too. He can’t do that. But he’s ready to take it to the courts and try it out. And even if he loses in the court, he’s going to try it because he knows the psychology of people is that if you bully and demean people enough, they’ll quit their jobs.
So all the stuff that the Republicans are doing is bad and illegal. And we are trying to use every tool that we have for leverage. But in this particular battle involving this seven-week C.R., what we are fighting to make sure is that tens of millions of Americans don’t lose health care over the next couple of months.
Because they are often being asked to do things that are, if not illegal, immoral. Like, he almost suggested yesterday that you shouldn’t report sexual harassment, you shouldn’t report racial discrimination. That was very scary to me. Because we want civilian control of the military—but maybe not this kind of civilian control.
So what should people in jobs like that, who work for the government, do?
And, you know, I think a lot of rank-and-file members of the military and veterans were shocked, disgusted, couldn’t believe what they saw yesterday. I mean, I’ll say this. I actually saw this on the U.S. Marines Reddit. Somebody said, that was not for the generals. That was for the American public.
Because, you know, Donald Trump is a reality TV star. Like, let us not forget that this man—not only is he not for our troops, he has said nothing but disparaging remarks about our troops and done disrespectful things, both to troops and our veterans. This man does not care about our military. But he is interested in shows of strength and trying to be a strongman. He even said that the other day, that he wants to be, you know, viewed as a strongman. And so that was a show. That was a show for the American people.
It was not a show for the military necessarily, though obviously Pete Hegseth thinks that he—I don’t even, I’m trying to be [rude]. But let me just say this: the things that they are being asked to do are illegal.
So what I would say to any either commissioned officer or just rank-and-file member of the military right now is: go back to your oath, go back to your training, and go back to the laws that you were taught when you enlisted or did your officer training. Be very clear about what your responsibilities are, what your duties are to this country. And if you are being asked to do something that is illegal, immoral, wrong, you have rights.
And certainly there are a lot of efforts to help support federal employees. So there’s an organization called Democracy Forward that is actually representing a lot of federal employees in these lawsuits against the administration. And they can even provide direct legal advice to members of the military and federal workers. So I really encourage people: know what your rights are.
I’ll say this: at the end of the day, every human who lives their life here on earth has to look themselves in the mirror. And at the end of your life, you need to be able to say to yourself when you look at yourself in the mirror: I did what I knew to be right. And so if you’re being asked to do something right now that you know is wrong, do the right thing. Because you will have to live with that.
And so get a lawyer, talk to your union, know what your rights are. And I’m saying that as well for these military officers. You know, you went through a lot of training to get where you’re at. You know what your rights and responsibilities are.
And so know your rights and protect your rights, because at the end of the day, you get to make the decision about how you conduct yourself and whether or not you carry out things you know are wrong—or whether you do the right thing and stand up.
How would you respond to that kind of argument? Like, what do you—like, I don’t love it, but I understand what it sort of means in a certain way. How do you respond to that? The election settled that Donald Trump gets what he wants to do now.
I mean, I think more than anything, if you look at the actions of Donald Trump and his allies and the people around him, he has so little regard for everyday Americans—so little regard for their lives, their dignity, their ability to thrive. He is more interested in corruption, in making money for himself and his friends and his family, and more interested in holding on to power than he is in anything else. And he says it, he shouts it from the rooftop every day that they’re doing something to help the American people. They clearly don’t care about the American people, and they’re going to do whatever they want, whether or not Congress says this or that.
And so that is why we need our Republican colleagues here in Congress to stand up, get a backbone, understand the Constitution, and fight back. Democrats are doing that, but we need our Republican allies to join us in that fight, or we are literally going to lose our democracy.
So I don’t agree with my Democratic colleague from Pennsylvania. I understand that he has a different point of view and position where he sits, and that is his prerogative. But also the people of Pennsylvania have a prerogative too, if they don’t agree with that. So, you know, our job right now is to fight for the American people.