LEADER JEFFRIES: “WE HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO SIT DOWN AND FIND COMMON GROUND WHERE POSSIBLE”
NEW YORK, NY – Today, Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries appeared on MSNBC's PoliticsNation with Rev. Al Sharpton where he emphasized that House Democrats will continue to extend the hand of partnership whenever possible and push back against MAGA extremism whenever necessary.
REV. AL SHARPTON: Joining me now here on set is House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York. Minority Leader Jeffries, we appreciate you joining us tonight. This week, after three weeks of infighting, the House Republican Caucus elected a new Speaker, far right Louisiana Congressman Mike Johnson, a devoted defender of Donald Trump, a 2020 election denier whose views anti-LGBT, anti-abortion, anti-Muslim, opposed to separation of church and state and, having only been in the House since 2016, he's the least experienced Speaker in 140 years. What does his ascent say about the House GOP right now?
LEADER JEFFRIES: Well, good evening, Rev. Great to be with you. I mean, I think from the very beginning of this Congress, the extreme MAGA Republican ideology has been on full display and now that might accelerate. Remains to be seen what the tenure of Speaker Mike Johnson may be. On the Democratic side, we continue to make clear, as we have from the very beginning of the year, that we will seek to find bipartisan common ground whenever and wherever possible with our Republican colleagues for the good of the American people. However, we will continue to push back against MAGA extremism whenever necessary.
REV. AL SHARPTON: Staying with the new Speaker- you met with him and President Biden Thursday to discuss the administration's nearly $160 billion national security funding request, which bundles $14 billion in aid to Israel and $60 billion to Ukraine- to Ukraine aid, which Johnson has opposed in the past, joining 93 Republicans in voting for an amendment to last month's Defense spending bill to cut that aid off. Now, as Speaker Johnson has asked the administration to, quote, bifurcate the requests in line with a number of Republicans calling for separate votes on aid to Israel and Ukraine. But he's also reiterated that Russia's invasion must be stopped. What's your sense about how this will go?
LEADER JEFFRIES: Well, in my view, the package that was sent up by President Biden, which relates to providing support for Israel, providing support for Ukraine in its effort against Russian aggression, providing support for humanitarian assistance for Palestinians who may be in harm's way or others who may be in harm's way, Palestinians in Gaza, as well as meeting some of the needs of trying to strengthen the situation at the border and standing with our other allies in the Indo-Pacific or throughout the free world. These things will move forward together because they all relate to our values and to America's national security interests. And it is necessary, as Speaker Johnson has indicated, that we stop Vladimir Putin and his brutality in his tracks in Ukraine. It's the right thing to do for the free world. It's the right thing to do for our allies in Europe. It's the right thing to do for the principles of democracy, freedom and truth.
REV. AL SHARPTON: And it's the right thing to do with Israel and Palestine, where you have individuals on both sides that have nothing to do with the politics that are now being killed and slaughtered and displaced. But let me ask you about this, this week's mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine, that killed 18 people who so horrific, the killing, that it compelled your colleague, Maine Congressman Jared Golden, to reverse his opposition to an assault weapons ban. You contrast that with the new Speaker's response to Wednesday's tragedy, from his interview Thursday night with Fox News, to my audience who missed it, take a listen.
SPEAKER JOHNSON (video): At the end of the day, the problem is the human heart. It's not guns. It's not the weapons. At the end of the day, we have to protect the right of the citizens to protect themselves and that's the Second Amendment. And that's why our party stands so strongly for that. This is not the time to be talking about legislation. We're in the middle of that crisis right now.
REV. AL SHARPTON: Congressman, as President Biden calls for congressional action on guns, how do you hope to make any progress on the issue of gun violence with someone holding that position?
LEADER JEFFRIES: Well, Congressman Golden, first and foremost is a good man, he's a patriot, he's a veteran. He's served his country ably in uniform and is now serving the people of Maine. I think we need to come together and look at common sense gun safety measures that are designed to address what has become a uniquely American challenge in terms of the gun violence epidemic and the carnage that continues to be inflicted on the American people. 18 innocent souls lost their lives in Maine. They were gunned down by a weapon of war. Weapons that were not used to hunt deer, that were used to hunt human beings. And that's a big challenge that we've got to confront.
REV. AL SHARPTON: Switching gears, Congressman, you had two developments this week involving electoral maps, both with implications for 2024. In Georgia, a U.S. federal judge ordered that the state's Republican-drawn congressional and state legislative maps must be redrawn in the next five weeks, ruling that the maps diluted Georgia's Black vote in violation of the Voting Rights Act. And in North Carolina, where the Republican supermajority in the state legislature passed a congressional map that will likely flip at least three seats for the GOP, 10 out of 14 of the state's new districts now favoring Republicans. That map takes effect immediately. With 2024 just weeks away, what are your thoughts?
LEADER JEFFRIES: Well, House Democrats, we're going to continue to make our case to the voters based on our track record of success. President Biden has done a tremendous job in leading. We've gotten big things done for the American people in terms of bringing jobs back home to the United States of America, clean water in every community, dropping the price of insulin to $35 per month. These are incredible accomplishments that, you know, relate to us building an economy that works for everyday Americans from the middle out and the bottom up. That's our vision for the future, people over politics. On the other side of the aisle, what we see is that Republicans are leaning into voter suppression and intense partisan gerrymandering as an electoral strategy. That's been the reality of this modern version of the Republican Party. We saw intense gerrymandering in the last election cycle in Florida, in Alabama, in Louisiana, in Georgia, as has now been confirmed by a federal court, now in North Carolina. It's an electoral strategy for the extreme MAGA Republicans. We're going to fight them in court. Attorney- former Attorney General Eric Holder has been doing a tremendous job, as well as other lawyers who are dealing with this in state after state after state. And we're going to continue to lean into our ideas. At the end of the day, I believe, across the country we'll have a fair map, a map that we can win on, and we'll take our case to the American people.
REV. AL SHARPTON: One more question about 2024. With former Vice President Pence announcing today that he is dropping out of the race and with the new Speaker, Mike Johnson, in mind because he was a leading figure in the House Republican efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results and now he is in a position as Speaker where he could very conceivably play a leadership role in deciding the next one. I mean, January 6th was about stopping certification. If you have a Speaker and you have a close vote, he may not want to convene the House to certify the election. How do you deal with that? What are your thoughts? How do we, I mean, some say he's Jim Jones- Jim Jordan with a jacket on. How do you deal with that?
LEADER JEFFRIES: Well, this is why we've got one electoral mission. Democrats need to win back the majority in November of 2024 so that it's a Democratic majority that is prepared to certify the election on January 6 of 2025. But everything is on the ballot. Democracy will be on the ballot, as evidenced by the position that many of the election deniers on the other side of the aisle continue to hold. Reproductive freedom will be on the ballot. We believe in a woman's freedom to make her own reproductive health care decisions. They want to criminalize abortions and impose a nationwide ban. Social Security and Medicare are on the ballot. We believe that these things are important parts of the fabric of the American dream. The other side of the aisle wants to end Social Security and Medicare as we know it. The stakes are high. We've got to lean in, we've got to show up, we've got to speak up, we've got to stand up and we've got to prevail.
REV. AL SHARPTON: Do you think you can have some conversations with this new Speaker Johnson and make some headway? I've known you 15, 20 years you were a member of the National Action Network and you've always been one to try to balance things. Do you think you can find some balance with Johnson?
LEADER JEFFRIES: You know, we have a responsibility to sit down and find common ground where possible but hold the line on our values. We'll continue to do that. We're going to strongly disagree in a lot of areas, but we can agree to disagree without being disagreeable.
REV. AL SHARPTON: House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, thank you for being with us in studio.
Full interview can be watched here.