LIVE: House Democratic Caucus Leaders Hold Post-Meeting Press Conference

I can do this. And these new members understand what Roe meant for women and how the Dobbs decision is putting women at risk every day across this country. The subject of reproductive freedom was absent from Monday's inaugural address, as well as the bizarre rambling speech that followed. Also absent from Donald Trump's speech was any mention of specific policies that he will do to bring down the cost of groceries, housing, childcare, and medicine. None of the executive orders will do anything meaningful to make life more affordable to working families. What we got was a room full of the richest people on earth plotting the prospect of more tax cuts for them and more corporate consolidation that will lead to fewer choices and higher prices for consumers. My local Costco was out of eggs this weekend, we ended up paying $14 for 18 eggs. That is a much bigger problem for working people than the name of the Gulf of Mexico. House Democrats are ready to work with anyone to bring down the cost of living. But so far, Republicans have failed to show us that they're interested in doing anything that helps working families. Their focus has been on the billionaire class that helped them win elections. Vice Chair Ted Lieu. Thank you, Chairman Aguilar. I want to thank Representatives Brad Sherman and Judy Chu this weekend for leading a tour of the devastating fires in Southern California, both the Palisades fire as well as the Eaton fire. I had the opportunity to go on both of those and the devastation is significant. This is why we need to get disaster relief to the disaster victims in California and not condition aid. We have never done that before in the United States of America. We should not be leveraging the pain and suffering of disaster victims to try to jam through political priorities. And I just want to note that last month, Congress passed American Relief Act. It was to help disaster victims in Florida, in Oklahoma, in South Carolina, the Democrats say, hey, we want to condition aid because they're red states. No, we did not. Because at the end of the day, we're all Americans, we're all God's children. And it is simply immoral, not Christian and un-American to force disaster victims to not get aid because of particular policy priorities that Republicans may have. I also want to just correct the record on some things the speaker has said, because they're simply incorrect. He said on national TV that there was a lack of water in Southern California to fight the fires and this reservoir was offline because of a fish known as a Delta snow. That is just incorrect. The reservoir was offline because it was undergoing repairs. Now there's an investigation as to why is that when there was a potential fire that could be coming. But nothing to do with fish, it simply was offline for repairs. He also said that we've conditioned aid in the past, he mentioned Hurricane Katrina. We did not do that. We did not say, hey, before we give money to Louisiana disaster victims, we want Louisiana to do more on climate change. Democrats did not ask for that, no one asked for that, and that should not happen now. And so I just want Congress to pass relief as soon as possible and not condition aid. And now it is my honor to introduce the amazing Representative Janelle Bynum. She was a fantastic state legislator in Oregon, and she's now a fantastic member of Congress. Thank you, Congressman Little. Vice Chair Little, Chair Aguilar, 52 years ago, with Roe v. Wade, our country established the fundamental freedom for women to make their own health care decisions. And as a result, more women had access to critical care and better health outcomes. Since then, we've seen anti-choice extremists roll that right back, and they've taken steps to ban access to reproductive care entirely. And it is my belief that this has had devastating impacts on women across the country, disproportionately affecting women of color, women with low incomes, and women in rural communities. Now, this week, House Republicans are having us vote on a bill that continues to undermine women's access to health care. For me, that's unacceptable, and it's frankly not what I was sent here to work on. So I'll be voting no. The evidence is clear. In states with less access to care, maternal mortality is higher, infant deaths are higher, and racial inequities are greater. These restrictions also make it harder for expecting mothers to receive the care they need in pregnancies and complications. So that is why I will fight for all women to have access to reproductive care, and to be able to make those decisions for themselves. I believe that women shouldn't have to pay thousands of dollars to travel across state lines or risk prosecution to access basic health care. For me, it's nonsense that my daughters, I have two of them, that they'll have less rights than I did at their age. It's nonsense that they've had to decide where to live and go to school based on where they'll have rights. And it's nonsense that my daughters are less safe because of government interference in their health care. It's time that House Republicans put aside this foolishness and start focusing on real issues like eliminating maternal mortality and increasing rural access to health care, like lowering costs and creating good jobs, and like working across the aisle to deliver real results for real people. Thank you. And now I'll hand it over to Rep. Kelly Morrison of Minnesota. Thank you, Representative Bynum. Good morning, everyone. I'm Congresswoman Kelly Morrison. I represent Minnesota's 3rd District. And for more than 20 years, I've had the honor and privilege of caring for patients as an OBGYN. And now I'm very proud and humbled to be the first and only pro-choice OBGYN in Congress. Two and a half years ago, the Supreme Court overturned 50 years of precedent and issued the Dobbs decision, overturning Roe v. Wade and for the first time in our country's history, taking away a right. Today, as we recognize what would have been the 52nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we acknowledge the harsh reality that our country is facing. A maternal health crisis was unfolding across the United States before Roe was overturned, but that decision has only served to accelerate that crisis. Today, women have less rights to health care than their mothers and grandmothers did. Forty-four percent of women and more than half of Black women of reproductive age live under abortion bans. Over a third of counties in the United States are maternity care deserts. And we're facing a shortage of OBGYNs that is only expected to get worse. These are serious and dangerous threats to women, children, and families. Voters across the country have shown that they want to preserve a woman's right to access the health care that she needs. Voters in red, purple, and blue states from Missouri and Montana to Arizona and Colorado to New York and Maryland voted for reproductive freedom in this past election on state ballot initiatives and constitutional amendments. And I want every woman to know we see you, we hear you. House Democrats will do everything we can to prevent this Republican Congress and this administration from going against the will of the people and further eroding your rights. Unfortunately, later this week, Republicans will resume their efforts to restrict access to maternal health care, pushing through a bill designed to confuse, frighten, and misinform people and criminalize medical providers. A cruel bill that singles out patients who are facing one of the worst days of their lives. In this moment, we should be doing everything we can to support women and their doctors, not attack them. So on this anniversary of Roe vs. Wade, we mourn what has been lost and we redouble our efforts to restore your rights. We will never back down. We will always fight for your right to reproductive freedom. Thank you. And I will turn it back to the chairman. Questions? Look, our job is to give members the information that they need. And to support them in the decisions that they make to represent their constituents. Members will vote their districts. Members have to balance, as I've talked about before, their love for this country with the job that they have to do for their constituents. We expect them to do both in the votes that they make. We have said very clearly on the topic of immigration that the Democratic caucus believes in a safe and secure border. We believe in order at the border and a fix to our broken immigration system. We also believe in ensuring the public safety of our communities. We've talked extensively about bipartisan bills that Senate Republicans killed at the request of Donald Trump that would have done that, would have had meaningful change to our border system and our immigration system. At the request of Donald Trump, they didn't take that up. We will work with anyone, including Republicans, on fixing these issues. We will not fall for their heightened rhetoric. And we will ensure the safety of our communities. Michael. Oh, we live those. Thank you for the question. We live those values each and every day. This is the most diverse caucus ever assembled in the history of Congress, from every corner of our country, every background. That's who the Democratic caucus is. And so we will carry forward with those values because that's who we are. In the committee work that we do, in the decisions that we make, in the policy that we advance, we live those values. It's unfortunate that a lot of the decisions, including this one that Donald Trump did on day one, don't do anything to address real issues that Americans are facing. None of these affect lowering the prices of groceries that Donald Trump said he would do on day one. And they reduce our ability to hear different ideas and perspectives when we make decisions. That's the goal of what we should be doing. And that will continue to be the North Star of what House Democrats advocate in advance moving forward. Joe and Cassie. Look, I think what we support are local cities and local states making decisions that they feel are in the best interest of, in the best safety interests of their communities. Many states have taken positions on immigration in order to protect their communities. And one of the first steps Donald Trump does is allow raids in churches, workplaces, community centers, funeral homes. Those are the decisions that Donald Trump and his administration are making. So we understand that people are scared. We understand that people are frightened because Donald Trump, with the support of House Republicans, have now said, this is within bounds. And so what we expect are local leaders and local law enforcement to live by decisions, to live by the federal rules, state and local laws that guide this. And some of them have taken different positions on that. And so we respect the rule of law. We hope that Republicans do as well. Cassie. I yield to the vice chair here momentarily that has discussions about what the limits of presidential pardon authority should be. I support that robust discussion, and I would live by the law of the land. As I mentioned in this room, and I've mentioned publicly, I didn't advocate for a pardon. I didn't feel it was necessary. I felt that we did our job in a bipartisan way to tell the truth of what happened on January 6th. We did so with the speech and debate clause as a protection to the work that we do. But I understand why President Biden made this decision. But it's not lost on me that Donald Trump doesn't care what a single piece of paper says. He will do what he wants to do. And if that means retribution against members of the committee, he will do it, whether it's through the Burleson bill or whether it's through other means. A simple piece of paper does not protect anybody from Donald Trump and his administration. We know that going in. So we're going to carry out the work that is ahead of us. But we're also going to continue to talk about the promises that Donald Trump made that affect everyday Americans and the costs and the burdens that they face. And he's doing nothing. All of this January 6th, pardons, putting public safety in danger. You know, that's what is so tough. And let's give you an example of the type of people who Donald Trump pardoned. A guy named Albuquerque Cosperhead punched Officer Fanon in the chest and other officers with riot shields. He was the one who yelled, I got one, when he put Officer Fanon in a chokehold. When some rioters tried to protect Fanon, this guy attacked him again and hit him in the head. He was sentenced to seven years and six months. He was not in the wrong place at the right time, at the wrong place at the wrong time. He had 45 previous arrests. That is the type of individual that Donald Trump has now put back into the community in which he came from. That is wrong. That is not what J.D. Vance committed to in an interview last week, what would happen. That is not what Speaker Johnson said would happen. These violent offenders are roaming the streets because Donald Trump took these actions. I look forward to a robust debate in the House Judiciary Committee on the pardon power. I just want to know what Republicans are trying to do right now is to equate two things are just not the same at all. Doing a preventative pardon of members of Congress who served on January 6th Committee is not the same as pardoning 1,500 people who committed crimes, some of them who assaulted police officers violently. I'm just going to read you some highlights that Congressman Jason Crowe posted on social media about who some of these people are. One of the folks that Trump pardoned was Riley Casper, a felon who assaulted a police officer. This is what Riley Casper said. There's definitely something satisfying about pepper-spraying cops in riot gear and watching them run from you like a bitch, even though they have face masks, billy clubs, and full ******* body armor. Trump pardoned that person. Trump also pardoned David Dempsey, who pleaded guilty to two felony counts of assaulting an officer. Dempsey stomped on police officers' heads, swung poles at officers, struck an officer in the head with a metal crutch, and attacked police with pepper spray and broken pieces of furniture. What the current president did in pardoning these folks who assaulted police officers was massively disrespectful to law enforcement. I read through all the executive orders, the list of them that Trump ordered. None of them lower the price of eggs. This doesn't lower the price of eggs, and it's massively disrespectful. So hopefully, we will not get any more executive orders like this. Patience. I'm in front here. Well, I think it's been very clear that Donald Trump and his family often have times to business interests that we see advocate for policies. On this one, it seems pretty clear. The law went into effect. There was one mechanism by which there is a delay to implement the law, but that is if there is an offer, and they're working through that offer. I'm not aware of an offer. I voted for the bill in the best interest of national security. I would expect the courts and the administration to uphold. That is the law of the land. And individuals on both sides of the aisle supported this. I'm not aware of what the specifics are that the administration is talking about. I don't think any Republicans are of a joint venture or what is next. We expect them to implement the law. So no, you left out one important point that I did mention in that answer that was supporting comprehensive immigration reform. That includes ensuring a path to citizenship for dreamers and farm workers. Those are bipartisan pieces of legislation that have passed in Congress. If you put those up for a vote, those would pass. Oftentimes, they have not been taken up in the Senate, and that's unfortunate. But Democrats have not changed on this issue. Those remain core values that we put forward each and every day. We also understand that this is the Trump trifecta that we are operating under. So we understand what is ahead of us. We still advocate for these values. And we do support the violent criminals who pose a danger to our communities, should not be in those communities. I would say that whether they are immigrants or whether they are insurrectionists, we support comprehensive immigration relief. We support a secure and safe border. Those are things that the Democratic caucus absolutely support. But we will continue to talk about dreamers and farm workers and those who have adjusted their status to be here lawfully. I understand why he did it. It is an added level of protection. But we were prepared to represent ourselves and the institution and the work that we did no matter the consequences. And that was true for Chairman Thompson, Vice Chair Cheney. We stand by the work that we did, and we will continue to defend it and talk about it. We would have done that if we didn't have a preemptive pardon. And we will continue to do it now. So this is the world. But as I said, I understand why the president did this. And I'm appreciative of his support for us talking about protecting democracy and the importance of that. My belief is that he wants us to have the protections to do that, to talk about the importance of Congress as an institution, which he's talked about time and time again, as well as the importance of defending democracy, which is the job that we did. Thank you. Yeah, my job isn't to give advice to senators. They have a separate job than we do. Many members of the House also have supported this bill last week, as well as in the prior Congress. These are complicated issues that we are going to continue to discuss. Our belief is, my belief is, individuals could get swept up, individuals who are around someone who commits shoplifting, or individuals, DACA individuals who are near someone who is implicated or in a crime could be swept up and deported as a result of this bill. But there are a lot of thoughts and concerns about community safety. I respect that and acknowledge that. And we're going to continue to vote our districts and ensure that members have the best information to make the decisions in front of them. Thank you so much.