Rep. Deluzio Discusses Democrats Going on the Offense

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1:26Ben Meiselas:There were fireworks on Capitol Hill this week as Christy Noem, Department of Homeland Security Secretary, testified. Also, the FBI brought in other agents who tried to talk about Antifa, but couldn't identify who the leader was or what building they were. Let me just remind everybody what went down. There was this one moment in particular where Christy Noem was asked if ICE and Border Patrol are locking up and deporting veterans. And she said, absolutely, not were not doing it. And then she was confronted with multiple veterans who the Border Patrol and ICE went after. And she had to confront her lies right there.

2:04Ben Meiselas:It was a brilliant cross-exam by Congressman Magaziner from Rhode Island. Let's just watch it. Terry, how many United States military veterans have you deported? Sir, we have not deported U.S. citizens or military veterans. I don't believe you served in the military. I haven't either. But I think you and I can agree that as Americans, we owe everything to those who have served our country in uniform, particularly those who have served in combat. Do you agree with that? Sir, I believe that people that are in this United States that are citizens have legal status here. Madam Secretary, we are joined on Zoom by a gentleman named Sejun Park.

2:40He is a United States Army combat veteran who was shot twice while serving our country in Panama in 1989. Like many veterans, he struggled with PTSD and substance abuse after his service. He was arrested in the 1990s for some minor drug offenses, nothing serious. He never hurt anyone besides himself, and he's been clean and sober for 14 years. He is a combat veteran, a Purple Heart recipient. He has sacrificed more for this country than most people ever have. Earlier this year, you deported him to Korea, a country he hasn't lived in since he was seven years old. Will you join me in thanking Mr.

3:19Park for his service to our country? Sir, I'm grateful for every single person that has served our country and follows our laws.

3:25Ben Meiselas:And can you please tell Mr. Park why you deported him? Every one of them needs to be enforced. But you understand that many veterans struggle with PTSD. Many veterans struggle with substance abuse challenges. This man took two bullets for our country. You have broad authority, by the way, as secretary, to issue humanitarian parole, to do deferred action. will you commit to at least looking at Mr. Park's case to see if you can help him find a pathway back to this country that he sacrificed so much for? I will absolutely look at his case. There were other moments like that as well. But now I want to show you in a separate hearing where you had Benny Thompson questioning this FBI counterterrorism guy from the Trump regime about Antifa, because they're saying Antifa is attacking the homeland.

4:11Ben Meiselas:Here, play this clip. The executive board of the domestic terrorist organization, Antifa, that's our primary concern right now. All right, that's what President Trump did. What does the FBI say? We share the same view. When you look at the data right now, you look at the domestic terrorist threat that we're facing. Right now, what I see from my position is that's the most immediate violent threat that we're facing on the domestic side. So where is Antifa headquarters?

4:44What we're doing right now with the organization. Where in the United States does Antifa exist? If it's a terrorist organization and you've identified it as number one. We are building out the infrastructure right now. So what does that mean? I'm just, we're trying to get the information. You said Antifa is a terrorist organization. Tell us as a committee, how did you come to that? Where do they exist? How many members do they have in the United States as of right now? Well, that's very fluid. It's ongoing for us to understand that. The same, no different than al-Qaeda and ISIS. No, I don't want you to ask one question, sir.

5:30I just want you to tell us. If you said Antifa is the number one domestic terrorist organization operating in the United States,

5:40Ben Meiselas:I just need to know where they are, how many people. I don't want a name. I don't want anything like that. Just how many people have you identified with the FBI that Antifa is made of? Well, the investigations are active. Yeah, it's pretty cringy stuff right there and shows you what's really going on in this regime. I want to bring in Democratic Congress member Chris Deluzio, former Navy officer veteran. Um, great to see you. Let's, let's take those in order. Uh, first, uh, Kristi Noem with all of the horrors that are being inflicted right now on the United States by, you know, these border patrol and ICE agents who dress up like they're members of the military, but conduct themselves in the most atrocious matters in most cases possible.

6:30Ben Meiselas:Then the gaslighting, but she was confronted to her face right there. And, uh, what's your take on all of that, especially what they're doing to the veteran community as a veteran yourself? Yeah, I got to tell you, my colleague from Rhode Island there, Seth Magaziner, did a heck of a job. And if I heard that correctly at the beginning, she was saying they're not deporting any veterans. And then he presented her with a combat veteran who was wounded, who they deported. And so the willingness to just lie right directly to the American people at another time would have just been so outrageous and calls for her resignation would have followed immediately and that would have happened.

7:08And yet these folks seem to be divorced from any sense of obligation to say the truth. And look, what I also like about what Seth brought up was that folks who we ask to serve, I'm proud of my service, but I know this. Some folks struggle with that service. Some folks struggle with PTSD for the rest of their lives, for instance. And the response to that is some grace, some support, some help in the VA, care that you've earned. And it's just crazy stuff to see the just callousness toward even those who have taken a bullet for this country. Right.

7:46Ben Meiselas:And for those like yourself and Senator Kelly who have served our country, when then you have someone like Donald Trump who got five deferments from Vietnam and he's out there saying that you and Kelly should be on war tribunals because you just repeated the law about people should not follow people in the military should not follow unlawful orders. And I'm sure you've seen recently the tape has surfaced of Hegseth in 2016, going after Donald Trump, saying precisely the same thing as it relates to it. This to me is a part that we should talk about as it relates back then to waterboarding, you know, creating the feeling that someone is drowning.

8:28Ben Meiselas:We said back then under the Bush, well, well, well, we're better than even creating that feeling and that torture as a form of interrogation. interrogation. Now they're out just killing people and actually drowning people and killing people and saying, you know, whatever, we're going to keep on doing it. And then what? One of the people from Turning Point in USA is like, you know what will own the libs? Do it again. And then in response to it, Hegseth's like, I got one for you. Then he posts another video of killing people. You know, the wild part about some of the clips of Pete Hegseth is number one, he's saying the law and it's a responsible thing to say.

9:04It's the same thing that we said. But I chuckle, you know, Pete Hanks said in those clips, he called Donald Trump an armchair tough guy. He essentially called him a draft dodger. It's funny how things change now that you got some access to power. And even Pam Bondi, and this is the latest of this, an illegal briefing in the Supreme Court, like last year was saying the basic thing about what kinds of orders the military must follow, which is they always have to follow lawful ones and that no one can force the military to follow the legal orders. It tells you just how full of crap these guys are.

9:36They know it. I'm sure they know it deep down inside. And if not, they ought to just get new work because these jobs require us all to take an oath to the Constitution. The same one that I took as a 17-year-old for the first time, the Naval Academy, and that every service member takes. They'd be wise to remember those oaths.

9:52Ben Meiselas:That was a heck sense. Hey, he sounded like a different person. Like his voice changed. He like went through fascist puberty or something. I don't even know what I get. Sounded like a different dude from then to now. I want to talk about Pennsylvania. Donald Trump gave, you know, where you're a congress member from, actually a congress member close to where our youngest brother is from. Donald Trump rolls into town. He speaks at a banquet hall at the Mount Airy Casino where like weddings are held. And he says it's a huge crowd. And he proceeds to call countries in Africa shitholes. He says that everything is more affordable right now and things are incredible.

10:32Ben Meiselas:You know, he I mean, he looks addled. He starts just saying random words and then goes, I weaved it. I weaved it. You like my weave? You know, the whole thing was very bizarre. And then you had the MAGA Republican Congress members in those vulnerable congressional districts there as well saying, oh, it was so brave of you to come to Pennsylvania. We know how cold it is here. You're so courageous from stepping into Pennsylvania. I mean, it was like literally, I mean, this is like Loserville. I'm watching this and I'm like, this is Loserville. What am I watching? Look, the energy there is weak too.

11:05And I'll tell you why, right? People expect their members of Congress to be able to stand up to a president, no matter the party, if they've done something wrong or if they've failed. And this president has failed with full Republican control to bring down costs. And worse than that, costs continue to rise. People are getting pounded my constituents in pennsylvania are getting pounded people all over the country and they know it right they know that life is more expensive than it was this president promised to bring down prices prices have gone up since he's been in power with full control in the congress and so to see the weakness on display in the face of that failure from the republicans in congress man it tells me that they are scared that they are essentially acting like they're his puppets and we're going to beat their butts next year in the midterms

11:47Ben Meiselas:You know, one of the things, too, that you see is as you look into it, I know you looked into this National Defense Authorization Act. Like you had to find that within the Senate's version of this NDAA, they were like shutting down centers to help veterans. And you called it out. You know, there's so many strange things that like I wonder, like, how are these people sitting in around? We're sitting around in a room and just coming up with these ideas that are just like weird and cruel. So and like racist and disgusting. So, you know, two weeks ago, we could talk about them sitting around and go, you know what the Coast Guard needs?

12:24Ben Meiselas:What would it more? I don't know. More funding. I don't know. Better mental health. No, no. Swastikas and nooses. And let's bring back the Confederate. I was like, what do we need to do? Let's attack the nurses and say that they're not professions. You know what we need in airports? What? I don't know. Cheaper flights, better consumer. Pull-up bars. That'll show. And they go with pull-up bars. And then they're sitting around and tell us what you exposed because I'm like thinking, what are these people doing? I'll give you another one from the defense bill that just passed. So we got language in the House and Senate defense bill.

12:59Dems and some Republicans about right to repair. This is like telling the troops you can fix your own stuff. because oftentimes these powerful defense contractors, they block our troops from fixing things. They take forever. They overcharge the public. We all pay for it. And guess what happened? They stripped that language out to protect the contractors' profits and they're screwing over our troops who could fix things and they're making the public pay for it. So on top of everything else, they're doing that to take away the power of our troops to fix their own stuff and to make the public put more and more money into these defense contractors.

13:31It's just corruption on top of corruption down here.

13:34Ben Meiselas:And they talk about waste, fraud and abuse. And it's like, I don't know, pull up bars, right to repair, ripping away professional degrees from nurses. You know, it's golden ballrooms, great Gatsby parties with half naked women in martini glasses. random like what's going on here but before we go any final message you just want to you know we have six million subscribers out there um you know people are heading into this holiday season just you know concerned and worried about where this thing is going they see this deranged maniac in the oval office although i think people do feel a little bit of hope right now that that people have asserted themselves from where we were a year ago maybe counterintuitively because the country is doing so much worse, but there still feels like, okay, we're in this together now.

14:20Ben Meiselas:So what do you want to say before we go? Yeah, we should have some hope. I think we're going to win next year. And I think the country is with us if we've had enough of this guy. And I'll tell you in the face of the threats that he and others threw my way, you got people like me who aren't going to be intimidated, who are going to stand our ground and stand up for the American people. We're in this thing. And it fires me up to know there are so many behind me, with me, and serving with my colleagues who are ready to do what we got to do to win next year. Keep up the hope. Don't give up the ship.

14:47Be ready to win.

14:49Ben Meiselas:Congressman Chris Deluzio, thanks for joining us. Thanks, guys. Everybody hit subscribe. Let's get to 6 million. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our sub stack at MidasPlus.com. You'll get daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski, ad-free episodes of our podcast, and more exclusive content only available at MidasPlus.com.

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