Transcription
Thanks very much for joining me. I don't have to tell you, but we are living in unprecedented and dangerous times. It seems that every day there is an action or a statement from the Trump administration that is grossly illegal, crazy, vulgar, or all of the above.
In the midst of all of the chaos that we're seeing, I just wanted to say a few words to you about what I and my co-workers have been concentrating on. And basically, what we are trying to deal with are some of the most important issues facing the American people, in fact, the world. Issues that, in too many respects, Congress and the corporate media are not dealing with.
So, let me just start off with Trump's authoritarianism. I don't have to tell you that in the White House today, we have a president who is not only a pathological liar, but he is a narcissist, a kleptocrat, and an extremely dangerous person. He wants more and more power into his own hands and could care less about the Constitution of the United States, the rule of law, common decency, or democracy.
And the fight against authoritarianism is a struggle that we are engaging in on a number of fronts. Last month, I offered an amendment in the Senate that received 49 votes, all of the Democrats and two Republicans, to rescind the 75 billion dollars that ICE received as part of Trump's big beautiful bill, which, in my view, was the worst piece of legislation passed in the modern history of our country. So, we are trying to get money out of ICE so that they do not continue to occupy, uh, communities throughout this country.
And further, uh, with your help, with many of you helping, our campaign was able to raise $200,000 for some of the very courageous people in Minnesota and their organizations who fought back against the ICE occupation, uh, and showed us what grassroots activism looks like. Uh, and I should also tell you, obviously, uh, that in preparation for the 2026 elections, we are working really hard to support, uh, candidates all across the country, uh, who are standing up for working people. Uh, and perhaps most importantly, uh, we are going to do our best to make sure that these elections, uh, are fair, uh, and are not designed by Republicans, uh, to retain control over the House and the Senate. Lot that is going on that worries me very much about they're trying to, uh, create situations where people do not have the opportunity to participate in a free and fair election. And we've got to fight that, and we are in a number of ways.
Uh, further, uh, we have to continue to deal with what I consider to be, uh, the most significant domestic issue of our period, the moment that we're living in. And that is the growth of oligarchy, uh, in the United States. And sadly, uh, this is an issue that many of my colleagues, uh, in the Congress, uh, prefer not to deal with for obvious reasons. Uh, the corporate media, almost by definition, does not address it. But I think ordinary Americans, in their guts, understand, uh, that never before, uh, in the history of our country have so few individuals held so much wealth and so much power. Uh, today, with the top 1% 1% owning more wealth than the bottom 93%, we have more income and wealth inequality than ever before. Uh, while 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, the oligarchs are not only getting richer, but importantly, they are increasing their power by buying up media. I don't know if you've been following, you know, Larry Ellison and others buying up CNN, buying up, uh, CBS. Um, uh, Bezos converting the Washington Post into a right-wing paper. But, it's not only their control of the media. These guys are now making huge campaign contributions. We're seeing it right now in the midterm elections, and we're going to see it more as these elections unfold. They have un-limited amounts of money, and they are prepared to spend it to elect candidates who represent their interests and not the needs of working people.
So, when we are talking about saving democracy, it's not only the very serious threats, uh, of Donald Trump. That's very real. But, it is also the need to fight back against the corrupt campaign finance system, the endless, disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision, to get super PACs out of democratic primaries. So, that is enormously important, and you know, as part of that whole effort, Uh, I'm probably proud to tell you that our fighting oligarchy rallies have now taken place in 24 states all over this country, including some very conservative states. And well over 300,000 people have come out to these rallies, and they're not just progressives. They're not just Democrats. They are independents and Republicans as, as well.
And furthermore, when we talk about fighting oligarchy and dealing with massive income and wealth inequality, I think the time is long overdue for us to pass legislation that would impose a wealth tax on billionaires, a billionaires' wealth tax. And that's what I've introduced. And this bill would raise over $4 trillion in the next 10 years. And it would plow that money back into improving the lives of struggling working families. So, at a time when the billionaires have are doing unbelievably well and working families are struggling, I think it's time to tax that wealth, put it back into the pockets of working families, and improve their lives.
So, let me just briefly tell you what the legislation that I've introduced would do. First, it would provide every man, woman, and child, in its first year, uh, with a $3,000 check in families earning $150,000 or less. So, if you're from a family, uh, $150,000 or less, man, woman, and child, $3,000 direct payment, which will go a long way to help people buy the food they need, pay the rent, get the health care they need, long overdue.
Furthermore, we would provide very substantial sums of money into addressing the housing crisis, homelessness, uh, the fact that so many of our people are spending half of their incomes on housing, and we would build with this money some 7 million units of low-income and affordable, uh, homes and apartments. Uh, furthermore, at a time when many of our elderly people are having a hard time, uh, getting the dental care they need, the vision that they need, the hearing aids that they need, we would expand Medicare to cover those basic needs. We would also provide universal child care in our country and make sure that no one, no family in America pays more than 7% of their limited incomes on child care. At a time when public schools are finding it very difficult to attract the teachers that they need, we would make certain that no teacher in America earns less than $60,000, $60,000 a year. We would make sure that seniors and people with disabilities receive the home health care that they need through Medicaid, and we would prevent 15 million Americans from losing health care by repealing Trump's $1.1 trillion cut to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act.
The point here is that the billionaires have so much money that a kind of modest tax on their wealth could go a long, long way to buttress up the programs that working families, low-income people desperately need, as well as, in the first year, put a check of $3,000 into the pockets of every man, woman, and child. And I got to tell you, you know, I know that many of the media and many of the politicians, they just worry so much about our billionaire friends who fund them every day. Well, despite this tax, uh, I'm happy to tell you that Mr. Musk and Mr. Bezos and Mr. Zuckerberg and Mr. Ellison and all the other multi-multi-billionaires would still have a few hundred billion dollars left, uh, to feed their family. So, we're not going going them out on the streets.
Um, furthermore, I think what we need to do, uh, is, uh, address the very serious threat of AI and robotics. And this is an issue that I have gotten more and more involved in as I speak to people all across this country. Um, and we have talked to some of the leading experts in America who understand the economics of AI and robotics, uh, who understand the existential threat that these technologies face. I mean, just today, just literally today, it was announced that Jeff Bezos, the head of Amazon, not only wants to get rid of all of his warehouse workers and replace them with robots, he is setting up a $100 billion fund or program, uh, to try to eliminate human beings, workers in factories and warehouses, not only in America, all over the world. So, his dream is that you're going to have robots, uh, do all of the manufacturing and warehouse work, uh, in this country.
Uh, but it is not just the the threat, the very legitimate threat that we're going to be losing tens of millions of jobs in the next decade. And it's not only blue-collar jobs, it's, uh, white-collar jobs. Uh, many young people graduating, uh, college right now are finding it very, very difficult to get entry, uh, entry, entry-level work, uh, that they need. Uh, but I'll tell you something else. Uh, it is a, it, as important as the economic issue is, uh, as important, uh, as the privacy issue is, and there's real fears about what AI can do in sweeping up all kinds of information about us. Uh, as, as much as I fear about what it does to democracy and our political system, uh, in giving all kinds of information to powerful special interests who can use it to, um, uh, attack democrat the foundations of American democracy. There's something else out there that we should worry about. And that is, you know, uh, what used to be science fiction. Oh my god, the robots and the computers are going to operate independently of human beings. That's a good science fiction film. Well, you know what? Some of the most knowledgeable people in the world right now, people who have helped build, uh, the foundations of artificial intelligence. People who've received Nobel prizes for their work in physics, et cetera. They now believe that there is a possibility that as AI advances and becomes smarter, if you like, than human beings, that AI can become independent of human control. With the possibility of cata- cataclysmic, uh, impacts.
So, needless to say, this is an issue, uh, that we have got to address. It's an issue that Congress is barely aware of. They're dealing dibbling around the edges. But the fundamental issues of what this means economically, what it means politically, what it means existentially, what it means to the mental health of our kids, who increasingly are being addicted to these AI agents, uh, that discussion has not even begun in a significant way. And that's why, uh, I will be introducing next week, uh, legislation calling for a moratorium on the construction of data centers in America. And we do that not only because data centers, uh, are utilizing an enormous amount of electricity and water resources, driving up electric rates. But, we need to slow this process down. We need to work with China and countries all over the world to get a handle on the implications of AI. So, that is an issue we're going to need everybody to be involved in.
Bottom line here is that AI and robotics are not onto themselves evil technologies. But, when they are being pushed by the wealthiest people on Earth, Musk, Bezos, uh, Ellison, and others, whose goal is simply to get much, much richer and more powerful, we have got to say, "Excuse me, slow it down. We want these technologies to work for working people, for ordinary Americans, and not just for the very, very rich."
So, there is a lot of other stuff that's going on. You got a war in Iran, etc., etc. But, I just did want to, uh, say a few words, uh, uh, about some of the issues, uh, that we are working on. And And I thank you very much.