Thank you for taking my question. My name is Daria Richford. I'm a senior vice commander of disabled American veterans in Bergenfield. and I'm not getting I'm better at you. I heard Donald Trump say that John McCain was a hero. And I don't understand why any veteran or any currently serving military person has anything to say about this person. But the amazing thing is 65% of veterans voted for him. And if that 65% had been flipped, we would have the first woman president.
I'm the one of my guests to talk to veterans every time I see a veteran on the street, every time I talk to any veterans. i try not to be political about it because like i said it's not a regular thing it's a white or wrong thing and veterans should not be voting for this type of government that we have right now. So I'm asking every citizen. I know where you stand for veterans. I know where everybody here stands for veterans. I know where all America or most of America stands for veterans.
But the people, the veterans, the 65%, they're not hearing it. They're only hearing the rhetoric and the bullshit. excuse me, that they get from right-wing media. We have to get the message to those veterans. Like I said, when I was talking to some of my veterans in my DAV group, I'm able to get through to that. So we need everyone to get, if you know a veteran.
If you know a friend who knows a veteran, talk to them and ask them why they are not getting this message. And we have to stop them from starting to see it. I'm sorry. No, don't be sorry. You earned that right. Thank you, sir. Thank you. And I'm going to just say one thing, because this is what I've noticed about in terms of evidence, is when I say thank you for your service for a man like you, it's not just your service.
What blows me away about veterans in New Jersey is they come home and they keep serving like you are. They keep serving other veterans, they keep volunteering in their community, and they keep bleeding. And so... I'm going to mention this a lot. What he is doing with 80,000 layoffs in the VA.
with all the layoffs he's doing. And by the way, folks in New Jersey should know this. When I was mayor of my city, I cut the size of my government. It was difficult, but we didn't have the power to print money. We cut Newark's government size down 25%.
We laid off one out of every four of our employees. We made a lot of our partners a lot more efficient. I'm not saying that the federal government, God, the federal government needs to be more efficient and more effective. But the way that Elon Musk is going about it. He's like, ready, fire, and maybe I'll aim later.
But the way he is eliminating entire agencies, divisions, and new critical services that the majority of Americans, Republicans, Democrats really want is outrageous. And with no accountability, not one oversight hearing it is wrong. so sir i'm going to fight for veterans who want for me i'm going to stand for people that fell for me everywhere possible and this is the bad
This is some good political advice I didn't take from my county executive who said, Corey, stop it, stop it. He begged me to stop this. Because every time somebody from Birdfield speaks, I'm still trying to prosecute the fact that my last high school game... I lost to Bergenfield, and I'm upset about it. So I love you, sir. I love the town of Bergenfield, except for the 1987 football team. We are better than them all again. Okay. Go ahead. Also, where are you? Back here.