Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio News.
This is the first time in history that we've been in this situation. There has never been a party that shut down the entire government, or a party that shut down over a clean cr for nothing but political partisan purposes. Their rally illustrated exactly what we've been saying for the last twenty days. It's about politics and it's disgusting.
And that was House Speaker Mike Johnson on the twentieth day of the government shutdown, now the third longest in US history. Johnson's comments came forty eight hours after one of the largest demonstrations in recent memory, with the so called No King's protest happening in cities and towns coast to coast as demonstrators made their voices heard protesting against the president and his supporters in Congress. One voice that was there joins us now callin All Red, former Democratic
Congressman from Texas and now US Senate candidate. Congressman, thanks so much for being with us.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Millions of people were in these dubbed No King's protests this weekend. You were one of them in Houston. You saw the images, the pictures just the large crowds. The question, now, Congressman all Read, is how do you turn that into votes?
Well, first, let me just say that I was really proud of the folks who came out to protest the protests that I was at, and Houston had a lot of families there. I took pictures with, you know, moms and dads with their kids. There were some pretty clever signs, as you can imagine, and I thought it was about as American as apple pie. To be honest with you, you know, I'm a believer that you know, sometimes protests is necessary in this country. Certainly as a civil rights
lawyer in an African American I know that history. But you're right, we have to take that not just in terms of protests, but then make it into action in terms of voting, and then try and get policy to try and respond to whether I think folks are going through and what they're worried about, and what I saw you at the things protesting Houston was a bunch of folks peacefully protesting, but also with an idea in mind
that they weren't just going to stop there. They're going to take that into the next election.
We just talked to Senator Ted Cruz about this, and he said, unquestionably, we should take political peril seriously. President Trump said, nobody showed up, and those who did looked whacked out. And I don't know if you saw folks wearing t Rex costumes or if they were dressed like hot dogs where you were, Congressman, but we did see quite a bit of character and color out there. The idea though, that as the President suggested that they did not represent America, says, what's you Yeah.
Well, you know, it's pretty hot in Houston still, so you know, we might not have as many of the full on costumes as you would in other places at this time of year. But there were definitely some colorful
folks out there. But like I said, I saw folks also breaking their kids in little red wagons, So I thought it was a very organic and folks I think came and they were thanking me for coming, quite honestly, because they were just looking to have some way to express themselves outside of just I think dooms strolling on their phones. And I think they felt a sense of community. I think they felt a sense that they were not
alone and that their concerns were shared. By others, and I think it was something that there are some things that you don't plan for that are much more organic and just happen. You can try and have a rally or response to something, but what really happens is when folks are fed up, then they show up with they vote with their feet. And to spend part of your weekend walking around the heat in Texas for thousands of folks to do that, and to do it peacefully, I think says a lot interesting.
Senator Cruz, I think referred to it as astro turf in this case. So, Congressman, we've got a government shutdown that's now on day twenty, and we'd love to ask you about your campaign for Senate in this case, would you be one of those Democrats who broke ranks to vote to reopen the government if you were in the Senate.
Yeah, well, listen, I hate downs as a rule. When I was in Congress, my first I was sworn in during a shutdown. We introduced a bill pretty quickly thereafter called the Seas Act. It was called the Shutdown to End All Shutdowns Act, and we were trying to make sure that if this did ever happen again, the members of Congress and senators would feel the same pain as
working people out there who are not getting paid. But in this case, Republicans have the power, and the Speaker of the House has spent a month not calling the House back into session. They have the power to negotiate this and say, listen, we know that we need your votes, and we want to make sure that we are in consultation and negotiation the way things have always been done. And I'm sorry they have not used the power that they have to try and protect folks' healthcare, which is
what I think Democrats are standing up for. We have four million Texans, four million here who are in the Affordable Care Act exchanges. I just got an email from some of the associations that I'm a part of saying that with open enrollment is going to be starting next month and saying to expect dramatic increases in your costs in your premiums. In some cases, we may see those double. And if you see costs go up that much for your premium, that's basically the same thing as not having
health care at all. And so I think this is very clear and very straightforward. I hope Republicans will come to the table and negotiate and try to make sure we get in this shutdown as soon as possible.
Congressman, Before we let you go, we do want to talk about your race. You know the statistic as well as anyone. No Democrat has won statewide in the state of Texas since the early nineties. You ran, you did not win last time, and you raised a lot of money. So what makes you think this time around it's different.
Well, listen, what I've been trying to do is make sure that we reorient ourselves around what I think working folks are going through. And I think there were a lot of promises made to working people in the last selection about their costs were going to go down, that inflation was going to go away on day one, and we've seen the opposite. And I've been going around the state.
I'm not just going around. I'm trying to find areas where I can go directly to working folks because I'm constantly thinking about my mom, who was working two jobs and was watching me in the evening and she couldn't come to one of our town halls that we have, or to a political rally. But if I go to them on the job, then we can have those conversations. And so I was in grocery stores and construction.
Sites, and I talked to us. More time to talk about your race. Congressman, it's good to have Colin Hall read with us. This is gloomy.