Congresswoman Luria on Taking Back Virginia House Seat

0:00Ben Meiselas:I'm R.J. Decker, a private investigator uncovering the Sunshine State's darkest secrets. Tuesday, it's the premiere of ABC's hottest new crime show. R.J. freaking Decker as I live and breathe. He's a private eye. It's not a standard murder. It's someone bigger. And a public mess.

0:18Elaine Luria:Trying to get someone back to prison today?

0:19Ben Meiselas:You go to prison one time and suddenly it's all the jokes. R.J. Decker, series premiere, Tuesday on ABC and stream on Hulu. Tax Act understands you haven't memorized the tax code. That's why Tax Act has live experts to help. Tax Act can even do it for you if you prefer. It's the easiest way to know you're doing it right. Well, other than going back to college and obtaining a bachelor's degree in accounting with a minor in finance, then interning somewhere and becoming fluent in all tax forms. But that might be hard to accomplish before tax day. So maybe just stick with Tax Act. Tax Act. Let's get them over with.

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1:25Elaine Luria:Oh, I know you just ate, so you're craving something a little sweet. Besides, one cookie isn't going to kill you. How about half? Just a bite? Bite it. Bite it. Bite it.

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1:47Elaine Luria:Bite it. Shh.

1:48Ben Meiselas:Learn more at joinmochi.com. Mochi members have access to licensed physicians and nutritionists. Results may vary. Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans are crashing in the polls heading into the midterms. And now J.D. Vance has made things much, much worse. Vance throwing Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans under the bus with the most horrible speech imaginable in Wisconsin. But this is the national message that he's taking around, whether it's in Wisconsin, Michigan, Virginia, where there are a lot of Democratic flips that could be happening in the midterm. So take a look at the generic polling right here for the congressional ballot.

2:26Ben Meiselas:Democrats up 50 to 42 percent right now. So what was J.D. Vance saying earlier today? He was saying that, and again, it's all projection. He's like describing the Trump regime, but trying to attack his political opponents. And he's like, when the government makes bad policy and destroys your life, that's what we need to protect against. That's literally what y 'all are doing. Watch what Vance said moments ago. Let's play it. But here's the thing about the American dream. The government cannot give it to you for you, but the government with bad policy and bad leadership, it can destroy that American dream, whatever shape it takes in the lives of you and your children.

3:05Ben Meiselas:And then J.D. Vance says that when you go to the polls in November, I want you to think who will protect your money from the fraudsters. Literally, this is like a regime, the Epstein class fraudsters in the Oval Office. But go on, JD, here, play this clip. ...perocity of spirit. And so I want you, when you go to the polls in November, I don't want you to just think about all the great things that we've accomplished, all the great things that we've talked about. I don't want you just to think about no taxes on tips and lower gas prices. I want you to think who is going to protect my money from fraudsters.

3:41Ben Meiselas:And the simple answer is it's Derek Van Orden and congressional Republicans. It is not the Democrats who created this problem to begin with. And then his final message was, you got to stop the crazy Democrats. Stop the crazy Democrats. Y 'all are a bunch of pedo protectors in the Oval Office. You are the Epstein class. You are the cabal. Here play this clip. I just want you to know that every single day I go to work and every single day Donald J. Trump goes to work and we fight for the American dream for you and your family, however you define it. We would really appreciate you not sending us a bunch of crazy Democrats in November.

4:20Ben Meiselas:So please don't do that. God bless you all. Thank you. Additional data points I want to share with you right now. This broke my heart this morning. A call for Minnesota into C-SPAN. A 65-year-old legally blind and disabled woman lost 28 pounds because she can't afford food under the Trump regime. She's starving to death. And this is an experience by millions of Americans, or at least hundreds of thousands of Americans, are experiencing this right now. Here, play this clip. And that's what my topic is. I had my annual physical yesterday. I'm 65 years old. I'm legally blind. I'm on disability. I went to my doc and I lost 28 pounds in the last year.

5:05Ben Meiselas:I did not need to lose 28 pounds. I did not try to lose 28 pounds. I lost the 28 pounds because I cannot afford to eat anymore. Under Biden, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

5:27Ben Meiselas:Under Biden, I was able to put$100 a month away for food, along with my SNAP. And I did okay. I could get fresh fruits, fresh vegetables, and meat. It is just me. But now, with grocery prices so high, propane, electricity out of this world, I now only allow myself$65 a month for food. Sharon, are you on SNAP benefits? Let me tell you, under Joe Biden, I received$80 a month for SNAP. That was taken away from me under Donald Trump. He took it away. He gave me$24 a month. I did receive that for a couple of months. Then he took it down to$12. $12.50 a month. I said, screw you. So I'm not doing that no more.

6:23Ben Meiselas:So now I get$65 a month, Mimi. And for them people out there, all them, all these Republicans that are doing so flipping well right now, I have three potatoes. I have a half a tomato. I have three bananas, one apple, one can of soup, a half a loaf of bread, one egg, and one can of green beans. I do not get paid until the third. I am disability blind. I cannot drive a car. I'm 15 miles out of town, so I am not able to just, oh, trot my butt down to the food shelf. I used to volunteer at the food shelf. I can't even do that anymore. I don't understand. I'd like somebody to explain to me, why is it always the poor people that are helping the poor people?

7:08Ben Meiselas:I don't understand. But what I want to say, Mimi, is that it's really close to coming. Like that man said, the end is coming near, and it can't be any more true for me. And next, I will share with you a Tony Gonzalez voter in Texas, right, right in Uvalde and a big Trump supporter. And you'll see that these Trump supporters, these ultra MAGA people are finally waking up here. Let's play this clip right here.

7:35Elaine Luria:I voted for the man twice now. For Tony Gonzalez? Are you disappointed?

7:44Ben Meiselas:Yes, ma 'am. You know, it's sort of like, you know, I'm disappointed in most of the Republicans. I'm not too pleased with the Democratic Party in San Antonio. And that's just me. I'm a Christian. I'm Catholic. Now, I asked him to describe with one word Tony Gonzalez, and he said sad. I asked him the same question about Donald Trump. He said delusional. Chris, he says that he was a Trump supporter through and through. But he said that as Donald Trump started speaking without thinking about things, that's when he started changing his mind. And he says that that has happened over and over so many times.

8:32Ben Meiselas:So one of the big questions for me was, wait, so would you vote for a Democrat? Is that how strongly you feel? And he said that going forward, he's going to look at the person, not the party. And now Democrats are looking to pick up seats, of course, in Virginia. And one of those districts that Democrats are eyeing is Virginia's second congressional district, where an incredible Democratic congresswoman used to be representing that district, actually fighting for the people of the district until this MAGA Republican congresswoman named Jen Kiggins came in and basically conned people and then didn't just vote against the people of the district.

9:15Ben Meiselas:own district outright fighting against the people of the second every single day. So Virginia too was currently represented by someone named Congresswoman Jen Kiggins, who lied to Virginians when she said she literally lied to their faces. She goes, I will work to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits, but then voted no. She promised to protect Medicaid and then voted to gut Medicaid. She promised to protect clean energy tax credits and then voted against that. probably the biggest proponent of DOGE, destroying the people's jobs in Virginia. So basically right now, the people of the second are represented by someone who each and every single day is attacking them, not representing them.

9:59Ben Meiselas:And so now I want to bring in Congresswoman Lurie. I'm not bringing in Congresswoman Kiggins. And so you represented that district, Virginia a second from 2019 till about 2023. There was that 2022 election. Kiggins came in and made all of these promises. And Youngkin came in and did the ads for her and said, we're going to be delivering for you. And it was a very close election. You lost that election in 2022. But now here we are heading into the midterms in 2026. And I think that people were like, damn, we got conned. We're now represented by someone who hates us. We need to get Luria back. So talk to us a little bit about this district and why you're confident you'll be able to flip it.

10:46Elaine Luria:Well, thanks for having me. And I would say that the folks definitely got conned by Kiggins. I think that's a good term. Like we should sort of start using that as a catchphrase. But here you have somebody, she's a healthcare professional and she votes against access to healthcare by gutting Medicaid. She votes against affordable healthcare by, you know, doing a little charade that says she wants to extend the ACA tax credits, but in the end, when given the opportunity to vote for them, she votes against them. And her most recent prank or stunt is, you know, yesterday there was an Aviation Safety Act.

11:19Elaine Luria:The woman was a helicopter pilot in the Navy. And what did she do? She voted against aviation safety and votes with Trump 100 % of the time. So, you know, everything she said she's going to do when she goes to Congress, she's actually done the exact opposite. So I think, you know, for my four years in Congress, I have a very good track record of representing and supporting the people of Virginia and their interests. And, you know, that's why I'm back in this again. We have to stand up for what's right. We have to have people in Congress who are going to do what they say they're going to do when they go to Washington and stand up for our democracy.

11:51Elaine Luria:You might recall in 2022, when I was running, I just, you know, served on the January 6th committee, standing up for our democracy, for what's right, to get the facts out to people about what happened on January 6th, to hold those responsible, who had called the mob to the Capitol to storm the Capitol, stop the vote. And there was Jen Kiggins. She wouldn't even say that Joe Biden had won the election. And she still won't. She's still perpetuating that lie.

12:17Ben Meiselas:Yeah, I don't do political ads, but I like your idea there. You know, you go, Kiggins lied to Virginians when she said that she would extend the ACA tax credit. Con by Kiggins. Con by, you know, a future career for me. I don't know. But let's talk about the fact that, you know, Trump has dropped so significantly amongst independent voters and Virginia has an independent streak. I mean, you had a Republican governor before, you have a Democratic governor now. They really couldn't be, they're like the exact opposite people right now. And we saw even with the types of executive orders that Governor Spanberger gave, the incredible, probably my favorite rebuttal, I've really ever heard that she delivered to whatever the hell Donald Trump delivered.

13:03Ben Meiselas:But, you know, we're seeing at least in the polling data, independent support of Trump only at around like 24 % or 25%. You know this district well. You tore every nook and cranny of it. Are you seeing and feeling something different right now than even you saw back in 2018, 2019?

13:24Elaine Luria:Yes. So, I mean, we're in a similar situation, but it's actually gotten worse. So in 2018, when I ran for Congress the first time and flipped this district from a Republican, And that was the same year that Abigail Spanberger, myself, Jennifer Wexton, so three Virginia women flipped three districts that year. And there was a lot of anger and momentum that said, you know, Democrats really need to come in and take over Congress to put some sanity in place. But, you know, you take that and you multiply it times 10, 20, 100. You know, people are just really fed up. They don't think that what the Trump administration is doing represents who we are as Americans.

14:01Elaine Luria:They don't believe in National Guard troops on the streets and ICE agents terrorizing people, shooting of American citizens in broad daylight. I mean, this is not who we are as Americans. The weaponization of the Justice Department against political enemies. I mean, this is pretty long. I don't know how much time we have, but we could keep going and going. But I think people really are fed up. They are angry about what this administration is doing. And they want to hold accountable every single member of Congress who votes in line with Trump all the time like Kiggins does.

14:31Ben Meiselas:You know, and as you mentioned, you know, she has a background in the military, but votes against it. You have a background in the military, of course, joining the Navy at the age of 17, but you supported it to you, you, you, your entire life. And it seems that whether it's our military, whether it's government employees and in Virginia, Virginia second, there's a lot of both. It just seems like there's, again, over there, an outright assault on something that's a major part of Virginia. I mean, military families, camaraderie with military, protecting. I mean, one of the things that you pioneered is the PACT Act, which MAGA Republicans voted against protecting the health and safety of military veterans.

15:23Ben Meiselas:And you see right now in the Trump regime, they're gutting of the VA and firing lots of federal workers who have military backgrounds as well. I saw at the People State of the Union that we ran, there was a story about just government employees who were saying that right now they're consulting shelters for unhoused individuals because they're a month away from foreclosure. And that's a story we're hearing and a tragic story we're hearing. And what are you hearing those stories in a second?

15:50Elaine Luria:Well, I will tell you that, you know, there's really probably nowhere else in the country other than Washington, D.C. proper that is more impacted by the cuts to doge, has more federal employees per capita. and 40 % of our economy is directly or indirectly tied to the Navy and DOD. We have the largest naval base in the world. We build all of the carriers and half the submarines. So when you start cutting the military, putting veterans' health care at risk and an assault on federal employees, it hits pretty hard where we are. And I hear that from people across the district, people who are furloughed, who are sort of stiff-armed and forced to take this early retirement, and people who are just, you know, fed up, like, I cannot continue to serve in this capacity.

16:32Elaine Luria:I believe in our country. I'm a patriot. I love our country. But, you know, I don't want to continue to serve in this capacity for our federal government under this administration. So I hear that just over and over again. And we need to make a change.

16:45Ben Meiselas:Congressman, before we go, where can people learn more about the campaign? And what's your final message that you want to put out there to our more than 6 million subscribers who are watching whether they're from Virginia or throughout this country or the world?

16:59Elaine Luria:Well, people can learn more about the campaign at Elaine for Congress, spelled out F-O-R, ElaineforCongress.com. So you can learn about the campaign there. You can support us from afar. And, you know, my message is that we have to flip the house. We have to flip the house to put a check on this administration. And this is one of those seats. I'm a red to blue candidate. So one of the 12 seats that's going to make the difference to flip the house. I've done that before in 2018. This is a D plus zero district. What does that mean? We are number 218. We are the swingiest of swing districts in the country.

17:32Elaine Luria:And we need your help from every corner of America to make us, you know, have the resources that we need to flip this district and flip the House of Representatives. So please look us up at Elaine4, spelled out F-O-R, congress.com. Congresswoman Elaine Luria, thank you for joining us. Thanks for having me.

17:50Ben Meiselas:And everybody hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers.

18:20Elaine Luria:you can take the time pursuing your passions. Time once spent sorting and waiting, folding and queuing, now spent challenging and innovating and pushing your way to greatness. So pick up the Irish flute or those calligraphy pens or that daunting Beef Wellington recipe card and leave the laundry to us. Rinse. It's time to be great.