Talking Trump's Tariffs and Marathon Speech with Cory Booker on Morning Joe

Joining us now, Democratic Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey. He is a member of the Foreign Relations, Judiciary, Small Business, and Agriculture Committees. Senator, good morning. We will get to your historic moment on the Senate floor. Many moments, I should say, on the Senate floor in short time. But let's start with these tariffs. Just noted, all the committees on which you sit, all of those are going to be touched by what we heard from the President of the United States yesterday in the Rose Garden. So let's just start most simply, your reaction to these tariffs and what could be sparking a global trade war. How is that going to impact Americans? Well, most Americans who voted for him or were putting their trust in him to do what he said he was going to do, which was going to be lowering costs for Americans. Before he did this, we saw inflation go up. We saw costs go up. Across the board, people were economically hurting because of the 73 days he had in office, including seeing the stock market go down so much that 401k plans were losing, on average, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of dollars. And so now he's added injury to injury by doing tariffs, that picking the most conservative estimates is going to add between $3,000 and $4,000 of costs to the average American families. He is betraying people who put their trust in him. We know our history from the Smoot-Hawley Act all the way to the current time that launching trade wars against our allies, launching trade wars globally, it's only going to escalate. And ultimately, the losers are going to be Americans who are already struggling with overly high prices. So, Senator, we're already seeing the response from overseas, despite the Treasury Secretary's words of advice to foreign countries saying, hey, just sit back, don't retaliate. That's precisely not what's going to happen. It seems like most of these governments have already said, well, we are going to hit back. How do you see this spiraling? Well, you know, it's going to continue to spiral until we, the people in this country, say enough is enough. 73 days, and this man has done things to increase our prescription drug costs. This man has done things to make health care less accessible, not more, with his attacks on the Affordable Care Act, the portals in which people register. This person is doing mass layoffs of veterans. The president that has now the record in American history, at least modern American history, for laying off veterans, many of them in the VA, thousands and thousands of folks who were serving other veterans. What this guy is doing to social security and undermine the ability for people to connect with that vital agency for their checks that they rely on, what this man is doing right now with the bill that's coming towards us to gut Medicaid, something that parents rely on, that children with disabilities rely on, with birthing mothers relying on, and also our seniors. In every way already, he's been causing chaos to our economy, hurting people. But now this is something like we've never before seen in my lifetime, a president launching a trade war that's going to spiral in ways that every day are going to add costs to Americans. Prices are going to go up. The hardship is going to go up. And maybe he won't feel it. Or people like Elon Musk won't feel it. Or his cabinet, which is dollar for dollar the wealthiest cabinet we've ever had. They may not feel it. But the families in New Jersey are going to really hurt. The people that have been struggling in this country to make ends meet are going to really hurt. The people that are doubling and tripling up in their housing, moving in with people because their rent is about 50 percent of their income, they're going to really feel it. This is not right. It is wrong. And more people need to start speaking out. So, Senator, there have been times where Democrats have been supportive of tariffs. We had DNC Chair Martin on earlier talking about the steel industry in northern Minnesota, his home state, saying that was a useful moment. We should note in the Rose Garden yesterday, members of the UAW, the Auto Workers Union, they were there. That's a constituency the Democrats have largely counted on. So talk to us about how your party should have the conversation about these tariffs and thread that needle. Well, look, we are a nation that has been very strategic. Presidents before this one were very thoughtful, very strategic about using this like a laser, being very precise in the application of tariffs as it affects us. This president is not doing that. He's coming in with a sledgehammer and really taking a smashing to our overall economy. Our economy is in a very difficult place right now. There are a lot of people hurting. And you have to think that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. And so, yes, there is a place for tariffs. We've seen that throughout the presidents of recent Republicans and Democrats who've often done these things in a thoughtful, bipartisan manner. But that's not the way this president operates. He doesn't come to Congress, doesn't work with a deep analysis of how his actions are going to impact people, everyday people. His callousness, his lack of empathy, the hurt he's about to put on with families that he's offering no reprieve to. He's offering, no, hey, this is how we're going to help you through it. He's just simply stepping back and wielding his sledgehammer and really is going to shatter the economic lives of millions of Americans by adding thousands of dollars of cost to their already overstrained budgets. Senator, we have a lot we still want to talk to you about, but we want to stay on this topic. Now back to Senator Cory Booker. Sir, you made history on the Senate floor this week, standing for more than 25 hours, delivering a speech protesting the Trump administration's policies. Let's take a look at just some of what you said. Tonight, I rise with the intention of getting in some good trouble. I rise with the intention of disrupting the normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able. I rise tonight because I believe sincerely that our country is in crisis. Republicans, as well as Democrats, are talking to me about what they feel is a sense of dread about a growing crisis or what they point to about what is going wrong. That bedrock commitments in our country that both sides rely on, that people from all backgrounds rely on, those bedrock commitments are being broken. These are not normal times in America, and they should not be treated as such. Generations from now will look back at this moment and have a single question. Where were you? Where were you when our country was in crisis and when American people were asking for help? Help me. Help me. Did we speak up? This is a moral moment. It's not left or right. It's right or wrong. It's getting good trouble. My friend, Madam President, I yield the floor. All right, Senator Booker, you're getting a lot of coverage and support for what you did. Tell us why you did it, and will we see this again? Well, you've been talking about it this morning. Why? I mean, when you have business leaders from across the political spectrum talking about the consequences of what this president is going to do, when he's brought so much chaos and uncertainty, as Andrew was saying, businesses need certainty. This is not going to result in what he's saying. This is going to result in more hurt and more pain. He's attacking our health care. He's attacking our retirement security. He's attacking education. He's attacking our very values by trampling on our Constitution. And then when judges, Republican-appointed judges, are threatened by him for impeachment or even the chief justice of the Supreme Court has to call him out, are we just sitting by and being witnesses to these kind of insults, outrages, and this kind of peril? It's a time that all of us do things that are different. And I have to be honest with you, the Democratic Party, me, I, we have to do more. And so I think we decided this strategy, my team and I, and I have to give a lot of credit to my staff. We just said, let's start trying to find better tactics, because our constituents are writing us painful letters about their hurt and their fear and their anger, demanding that we do more. We have to answer that demand. And so, you know, we decided to try to disrupt the Senate and bring hopefully a focal point on the voices of my constituents and around the country, people, and Republicans and Democrats who are just saying enough is enough. We've got to stop this. Senator, it's Lauren Leader. I wanted to ask you actually about the Senate. My understanding is yesterday, Senator Paul and Kaine united to try to pass a resolution or some sort of stopgap to prevent some of the worst of the terrorists, specifically on Canada. What do you see as the opportunities ahead for the Senate to potentially blunt some of the worst of the potential impact of the tariffs? What power does the Senate have now, you believe, to block what could be a terrible impact on America? Yeah, it was a marvelous sort of glimmer of hope. It really was. It was a crack. The first real crack we're seeing, and God bless Tim Kaine, and frankly, thank you, Rand Paul, for testing it and getting four Republicans to join with Democrats and say, you know, Canada has stood with us in every war since the War of 1812. They've bled by us. They are one of our top trading partners. Our economies are intricately interwoven. Many products Americans have crossed that border multiple times to help us to have both have a stronger economy. So those two joined together. This is the numbers. We did it with John McCain and Murkowski and Collins in the first Trump administration to push back on their attempt to tear down the ACA from 20 million people. We showed that we can appeal to the conscience of our country and to the Republicans here to say enough is enough. And the numbers here are clear. We need three in the House to stand against this president and his hurtful and harmful policies, or four in the Senate. And I believe if more Republican voices and independent voices and Democratic voices start coming off the sidelines and saying it's time for me to stand for my country, it's time for me to stand for veterans, stand for health care, stand for expectant mothers, stand for our children. If more of us start doing that, I'm sure that what we saw with the great move by Tim Kaine and Rand Paul will become more usual and ultimately will be able to score more victories in stopping this president from hurting American people. And Senator, lastly, returning to your speech in the Senate floor, it was really striking how much it meant to people. We heard from a lot of people, viewers of this show, others who sometimes ignore politics but were captivated by what you did in part because it did defeat the record from Senator Strom Thurmond, who had argued against the Civil Rights Act at the time. Tell us about what you've heard from your constituents, from other lawmakers, from average Americans about what you did meant to them. A lot of the voices that we read, the stories we read, we've been hearing from people that what they liked about it was that we elevated voices that are often not heard on the Senate floor. And that is so important. I also have a lot of friends, you know how your friends never let your head get too big, remind me that there are Americans right now, right now as I speak to you, who as the sun's coming up, they're working their second or third shift in a row just to try to afford. They've been on their feet. There's an IHOP on Bergen Street in Newark. I had a friend, she's now passed away, we called her Mama Tasha because she was one of the best servers you could ever imagine and often a counselor to her customers. She would do double shifts and triple shifts on her feet. I was asked to work with farm workers once. One day, the farm workers asked senators, 100 of us, me and Padilla actually went out and did it. That was the most back-breaking work. I was sore for over a week. There are people in America that are doing jobs, there's cops on the beat, they've been held over because of the challenges in their community. So heck, I stood for 25 hours. I stood for those people who are getting screwed over right now. And I think that a lot of folks were grateful that I did and elevated the voices and tried to shine some light on the people that this man is really hurting right now, people who are really struggling right now and are looking for more of us. And I've got to do more to fight for them because we are in really rough waters right now. What the president did yesterday is going to hurt a lot of people who are barely holding on. And so I've got a lot more to do for my constituents, but I'm hoping that maybe a lot of us who do enjoy a little more blessings in life and a little more comfort could know that, as Martin Luther King said, that what we are going to repent for ultimately as a nation is not for vitriolic words and violent actions of bad people, but the silence and appalling inaction of a lot of good people. Democratic Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, thank you very much for being on this morning. Thank you for having me. We appreciate it. All right, take care. I appreciate you guys for years. Thank you.