Alexandria (00:00):
How are we doing tonight? Are we ready to win? That's what I thought. Thank you. Thank you, thank you so, so much for welcoming me; Boise, Nampa, Idaho. Thank you so, so much. And I want to take the opportunity and I want to thank… Love you right back. I want to thank each and every one of you for making the effort to be here today, for taking the time, to join together.
(00:49)
It's funny, I was hearing that earlier today, on the television, there was someone saying, "Why is AOC, Bernie going to Idaho?" And I'll give you one simple answer. It's because you matter. It's because we matter. My name is Alexandria. Some of you may know me as AOC. And again from the bottom of my heart, thank you for welcoming me.
(01:31)
We're here together today, because we share, all of us share in the frustration and the heartbreak that comes from watching those in power, actively tear down or refuse to fight for, everyday working Americans like us. And we're here together because an extreme concentration of power, greed, and corruption, is taking over this country like never before.
(02:07)
You know, it's bone-chilling. Every day there's something new. And today we just saw President Trump express openness to taking U.S. citizens and sending them off, without due process, to foreign prisons. It's anti-American. But this concentration of power, greed, and corruption, is oligarchy. It's oligarchy in America. And we must acknowledge the terrifying moment that we are in right now and that what we are hearing and seeing with our own eyes, is in fact happening.
(02:55)
We are watching as our neighbors, students and friends, are being fired, targeted, and disappeared. This is real. People we love are being targeted and harassed, just for being LGBTQ. Our workers, our coworkers, U.S. citizens and immigrants alike, are being disappeared off the street by men in vans with no uniform. Educators are being fired for teaching American history accurately. And activists are being detained, with no charge or evidence for using their first amendment rights, especially if they are being used to end the war in Gaza.
(03:52)
In fact, the Trump administration admits that it has jailed Mahmoud Khalil, a young husband and father from, where I come from in New York, without any evidence or charge of a crime. They openly admit that they have thrown him in a cell, thousands of miles away, because he attended a protest and they did not like the content of his speech. And Donald Trump's detention of Mahmoud Khalil for his speech, is anti-American too, and we demand his release, along with the release of Rumeysa Ozturk, who he is also jailing for writing an op-ed in her school paper.
(04:37)
You know, Idaho, I'm so touched being here. I'm a girl from the Bronx and to be welcomed here in this state, all of us together, seeing our common cause, this is what this country is all about. Don't let them trick us into thinking we are enemies. Don't let them trick us into being weak, into thinking we can be separated into rural and urban, Black and White and Latino. We are one. And we make these demands because we do have power in this moment. All of us do. Every day people do. And it will never, this is important. It will never be just institutions, and politicians and officials alone, that uphold our democracy. It will always be the people, the masses, who refuse to comply with authoritarian regimes, who are the last and strongest defense of our country and our freedoms. It is you. It is you, Idaho.
(06:07)
We know that a better world is possible and we are willing to do something about it. But to get there, we need to be honest about how we got to where we are right now because this moment did not come out of nowhere. It has been a long time coming. The destruction of our rights and democracy is directly tied to the growing and extreme wealth inequality in America that has been building for years.
(06:46)
And it is not a coincidence that billionaires like Elon Musk, dumped billions into this election to elect Trump. And he sure as hell ain't doing it out of charity, Idaho. For years we have known that our political system has slowly but surely, become dominated by big money and billionaires. And time after time, we've seen how our government and laws are more responsive to lobbyists and corporations than the will of everyday people and voters.
(07:30)
And we also know, that the agenda of dark money to keep wages low, and loot our public goods to give to the rich, is deeply unpopular with the people; Democrat, Independent and Republican alike. But just look at what Republicans have been quietly doing in Congress. Voting to advance cuts on hundreds of billions of dollars from Medicaid and veterans benefits, so they can take that money and give it to billionaires in the form of tax cuts and sweetheart government contracts, to their own companies like SpaceX.
(08:18)
And I'll tell you, I've seen Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House talking, talking about Medicaid. First of all, Medicaid, I want you all to know, Medicaid is one of the most efficient government programs with the least amount of waste. Only 2%, 2% of people on Medicaid, are able-bodied and looking for a job. Only 2%. And I saw Mike Johnson on the television saying, "We got to stop all these able-bodied men from being on Medicaid."
(08:54)
First of all, like it's a crime for someone to have healthcare in America. Healthcare is a human right in America and everyone should have it. Everyone should see a doctor. We must end the indignity of not being able to afford medicine, a doctor's appointment, being able to take care of one another.
(09:21)
But that aside, that aside, we must know that these cuts are exactly how they are trying to loot. It's not about waste, it's about what they're trying to give to the billionaires who pay them. And you know who voted. You know who from Idaho voted to gut Medicaid for everybody, by the way. Both of your Senators Jim Risch and Mike Crapo, and your House members, Russ Fulcher and Mike Simpson. You deserve better, Idaho.
(10:01)
They know that that's not what you want. They know it is deeply unpopular. They know that it hurts the working families of Idaho, but they are not here to serve working families. They are here to serve themselves and the billionaires who pay them. And they know that the only chance they have, to get away with such an unpopular and hurtful agenda, is to stoke deep divisions along race, identity and culture, to keep us fighting and distracted. It's not going to work anymore.
(10:44)
But this has been the big money playbook, not just now, but it's been their playbook for decades. And that is why Donald Trump is not in aberration. He is the logical, inevitable conclusion of an American political system dominated by corporate and dark money. And if we are to defeat him, we must defeat the system that created him.
(11:21)
America, we are at a crossroads. We can either have extreme wealth inequality with the toxic division and corruption that it requires to survive, or we can have a fair economy for working people along with the democracy and the freedoms that uphold it. Oligarchy or democracy.
(11:53)
You know, Boise, I grew up in a working-class family. My mom cleaned houses and my dad worked on a small business and my parents worked themselves to the bone, so that my brother and I could have a shot; the American dream like so many of us here in this room. And for a moment there, it looked like we were going to make it. We had a home. Bills were getting a little less stressful to pay, and I was doing well in public school. And what may have looked like a modest life to others was a dream come true for us.
(12:37)
But suddenly, when I was a teenager, my dad was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. And after a long fight, we lost him. My dad actually passed away in September of 2008, just as the economy crashed in the Great Recession and millions of our jobs vanished across the country. It felt like the world of my family was falling apart just as the larger world was falling apart too. Overnight, my mom was left to figure out how to provide and put two kids through school, keep our house, pay off medical bills, all on a house cleaner salary. And that's how I became a waitress. Because it was millions of innocent working families back then who paid the price, while the billionaires and thieves who defrauded our financial system got off richer than ever before, and not a single one of them went to jail.
(13:46)
And that is the story that Republicans like to mock. Not mine, but all of our. When they say a waitress or a working person is unqualified to serve in Congress. When the fact is, many of us here in this room today, are far more qualified to know what real life is like than any of them ever will. And I tell this story, I tell this story not because it is special, but because of how common and normal it is. While the details may differ, so many of us know what it feels like for life to be one bad day, one piece of bad news, one major setback from everything falling apart.
(14:43)
And I'm here to tell you today, Idaho, we don't have to live like this anymore. We can make a new world, a better country, where we can fight for the dignity of all people. And that dignity looks like living wages, Idaho. It looks like stable housing. It looks like guaranteed healthcare and respect for all of our differences, no matter who we are or where we come from; oligarchy or democracy.
(15:17)
Boise, are here today because we choose democracy. We choose freedom. We choose justice. And that means we must choose to out-organize the oligarchy. We must do away with the power of big money. And that is why, even as a waitress with a long-shot campaign for Congress, I decided right then and there that I would never take money from lobbyists and corporations and I never will. And you know what, Boise? We ran against millions of dollars. We ran with no support. We ran with just the people and the people won. And the people can win here too.
(16:22)
When I first got to Congress, I was genuinely shocked by how the place worked. Even having run against dark money in the first place, the everyday influence of corruption and dark money was astonishing. And we, in Congress, have somehow conditioned ourselves to believe that is normal for elected representatives who have sworn an oath to the people of this country, to day trade individual stocks and make millions, with the sensitive information that we are entrusted with for the purpose of governing. Just look at what happened this week. But how can anyone possibly make an objective vote on healthcare, energy or war when their own money is tied up in pharmaceutical, oil and gas ,or defense company stocks? You can't.
(17:21)
And we saw it just happen with Trump's corrupt and disastrous and rushed tariff scheme. We saw Marjorie Taylor Greene buy that dip. I got one question for her. How much did you make? How much did you make off of people's despair? How much did you make off that panic? How much did you make off of that suffering? No more. We can't accept it. It was all. I hope we see now, that it was all about manipulating the markets, so that he could quietly enrich his friends who bought the dip before reversing it all in the morning.
(18:08)
Boise, this is a matter of fact. Donald Trump is a criminal, who was found guilty of 34 felony counts of fraud, liable for sexual abuse. Of course, he's lying and abusing and manipulating the stock market too. When he talks about rapists and criminals, he should look in the mirror.
(18:53)
But back to stocks. To be clear, I don't care what party you are, Democrat or Republican, it doesn't matter how powerful one is, or the position that one holds, members of Congress holding and trading individual stock is wrong. It is corrosive, it is destructive, and it needs to be banned.
(19:20)
I'll give you another example of something that I found so surprising. Just this year, I happen to be named to the Energy and Commerce Committee in Congress. Now, this is one of the most powerful committees in all of Congress. It controls two-thirds of the American economy; healthcare, energy, trade, technology, communications, manufacturing. And for years, lobbyists fought to keep me off that committee because they don't like what they don't control.
(20:03)
And an interesting thing happens the day that the announcement went out that I was named to this committee. Our phones rang off the hook and our inboxes were flooded by every corporate lobbyist under the sun who suddenly wanted to be my best friend.
(20:23)
But you know what, Boise? Because of your support, because of you all showing up, because you allow me to not take a dime in corporate money, you free me to say "no." And we can free others to say "no" too. We have to free others to say "no" too, because I've seen how these groups bully and intimidate members of Congress, threatening to take money away from them or spend it against them if they don't do what they want. And what they want is for our lives to be as expensive as possible, on the lowest possible wage.
(21:09)
And I want us all to understand, that this constant pressure that we are feeling in our lives, of the water rising up to our throats, of the impossibility to afford anything easily, of the bitter divisions driven more by online algorithms and the truth of the fear of speaking up or for being who we are in public, the crumbling of our rights and protections, understand that all of this, right now, is what it feels like to be governed by billionaires. This is what oligarchy feels like. Not some day. Not in theory. Right now.
(21:52)
And the first step is to open our eyes and our neighbor's eyes to it because of course it is a system that depends on division to enable inequality, that will favor a president who is the best at dividing us and most skilled at his corruption. And it will also reward the Republicans in Congress who support that agenda, no matter what crimes are committed.
(22:22)
Big money is how we got Donald Trump. His whole presidency began with launching tools for bribery, meme coins, and crypto-currencies to fleece normal people and move money in the dark. Extortion settlements from media companies and the law firms who gladly pay them. The removal of duly elected officials. I'll tell you, even Republican. The removal of Republican officials, from where the inauguration was happening, in order to make room for who Trump really wants in charge, which is the billionaires that were standing behind him; Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk. And all of this has one central economic mission; to make billionaires richer at the expense of our country.
(23:15)
And so it does not surprise us that their first economic priority has been to target Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, the firing of our federal workers and the cutting of our veterans for hundreds of billions of dollars in budget cuts, so that they can hand that money off.
(23:37)
And Idaho, I know that looking around here, it can feel impossible for Republicans out here to defeated. But we are here for a reason because that's not true. It's simply not true. And from the waitress, who is now speaking to you today from this podium, I can tell you, impossible is nothing. Miracles start with mustard seeds and that is what each and every one of you represent today; small miracles of faith in ourselves, in each other, and in the refusal to give up.
(24:23)
So we are here for the long haul, Idaho. We're here to flip this state. We not giving up. From the most impossible place, we will drive for school boards and community associations, for small business groups and town councils, for public arts and gestures of inclusion, and we will build from there. It begins today. The work to give Russ Fulcher and Mike Simpson the boot and replace them with a brawling Democrat, who will stand up for the working people of Idaho. If places like Tennessee and Kentucky and West Virginia could be blue and go to red, Idaho can go from red to blue.
(25:30)
Beyond elections, our task is to build community, block associations, volunteer groups, church groups, PTAs, because community is the most powerful building block, we have to defeat authoritarianism and root out corruption. So when they try to take our school boards and rip down the rainbow flags, we say, "No. Protect our kids here." It's up to you.
(26:05)
And on a larger level, this is the path to guaranteeing healthcare to every American, to establish a living minimum wage, to take on skyrocketing rents and mortgages, to tackle the climate crisis and establish a country, where the American dream is actually possible for all of us.
(26:31)
So I'll end where I began. We might all come from different places, but we share so many of the same experiences. And so to all those who come here today, unsure of whether or not this is where you belong, I want to say that you do. You do. No matter if you have all the right words to say, no matter your race, religion, gender, identity or status, no matter, even if you disagree with me on some things, we saw some Trump supporters were protesting outside.
(27:14)
No, no. See, the thing is the difference between us is that we want their lives to be better too. We want them to have healthcare too. We want them to have a better wage too. But the only way that we do that is showing them that hate has no home here. So if you are willing to fight for someone you don't know, you are welcome here. If you are willing to fight for working people regardless of who they are, how they identify, or where they come from, you are welcome here because here everyone is valued.
(27:54)
But we have to stand together, Idaho. We cannot be tempted to turn in our neighbors or be fooled into thinking that we are really that much different than a trans kid who just wants to be accepted by the people around us. We can't be tricked into thinking that we're that much different than the dreamer who wants to come here and fulfill this country's promise. Because hate is a trap that sinks us all. And it is standing together, without exception, just as you all are doing today, to reject division. That, and this, is the only way that we can win.
(28:41)
So I hope that you see that this movement is not about partisan labels or purity tests, but it is about class solidarity. But thousands of you who came out here today, to stand here together and say, "Our lives deserve dignity and our work deserves respect no matter who we are." So we are here to make a sacred promise to one another.
(29:12)
Our goal here today is to commit to building the kind of country that we all deserve. And we will make that promise, to take care of each other on our worst days and to share in the successes of our best. And with that, I want to thank you, Idaho, for welcoming me here today.
(29:39)
And now it's my honor to introduce to you, the man who has brought us all together. Please welcome the one, the only…
