Senate Democratic leadership held their weekly press briefing on Tuesday.
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NewsTranscript
00:00good I'm glad you did okay I'm joined with Senator Kaine couldn't make it
00:10because we're running a little late but Senator Wyden and Warnock are joining
00:15with me against the Senate Republicans war on American families last week
00:21Donald Trump poured gasoline on our global economy and lit a match with his
00:27devastating trade war President Trump introduced tariffs on so-called
00:32Liberation Day but the only thing so far that Americans have been liberated from
00:37is economic stability as everyone knows right now the nation is in tariff chaos
00:44no one really knows what's going on especially the president these tariffs are
00:51self-inflicted catastrophe on the United States the market continues to teeter
00:57your retirement accounts are in a whiplash a report by JP Morgan and now
01:03they're normally a state banker but you know what the title of their report was
01:07there will be blood and it warned that quote these policies have sustained would
01:14likely push the US and possibly the global economy into a recession this year they
01:20continued with a warning raising the risk of recession this year to sixty percent the
01:27stock markets all over the place but what really is bothering the American people is
01:32the potential rise the dramatic rise in costs what they pay for food for medicine for clothing for
01:38housing for cars for gas the fact that in a recession it's harder to get a job advance in your job and
01:46it's harder to and it's more likely you'll be laid off it's more likely you'll pay for more so
01:52the American people are focused on how it will affect them in their pocketbook whether they own stocks or
01:58not the choice in front of leader Thune and speaker Johnson is simple are they going to choose Donald Trump or are
02:07they going to choose American families stand up to Donald Trump or watch him walk us directly into a recession
02:16and so far they're not standing up Congress must take action before Donald Trump causes even more damage to the
02:24economy last week the Senate took the first step past Senator Keynes resolution that would roll back tariffs on
02:31Canada to ease some pain from American families speaker Johnson must allow the house to vote on that
02:40bipartisan legislation that would reverse the sent list senseless tariffs in our longtime ally Canada
02:46Senate Democrats are trying to do more to help families worried about their costs their retirements economic chaos
02:54so that's why I was so deeply disappointed last Friday when every single Republican rejected in my
03:02measure to stop any tariffs since January 20th if prices for groceries and medicines and other essential
03:08goods went up they every one of them voted no and the voters are realizing that let me repeat
03:16Republicans had the chance to stop this pain for American families and every single one voted no
03:23but we won't be deterred in fighting for Americans that's why today I'm proud to be joining Senators
03:31Wyden Kane Warnock and others to introduce another resolution that would halt all of Trump's tariffs the
03:40Senate has the power and the authority to stop this madness we have a duty to act in a bipartisan way
03:46to repeal these tariffs we have the ability to put it on the floor and make them vote on it like
03:51Senator Kane did in his resolution same with Senator Wyden's and now let me call on him Senator Wyden
03:59thank you leader Schumer and I'll be short first of all Trump's tariffs have taken the U.S. economy
04:11from being the envy of the world to being a laughing stock in less time than it took to finish March
04:20madness I mean basically you just turn around and we are trying to basically dig out from under these
04:29incredible experiences so many Americans are having with their 401ks and trying to pay for essentials and
04:38and today in the finance committee we learned that the massive global tariffs are going to go into effect
04:44tomorrow and they said well maybe it would be scheduled and finally we got them to admit
04:51essentially right after midnight these are going into into effect and they are going to hit
04:58millions of Americans with what amounts to an economic economic fireball in terms of its power to them
05:09and apropos of what the leader just said it seems to me now the Trump administration is squeezing
05:18folks who work for a living senior citizens and others they're being squeezed from both sides
05:25the tariffs are hitting them right now they're going to get worse tomorrow and what we tried to do last
05:33Friday night is say for example that we were going to protect Medicaid for our seniors we lost by just one
05:42vote last Friday night but we are going to be back because for all those Americans who I've described as being
05:51squeezed by the Trump administration we owe them more fairness we owe them a fair shot we owe them an
05:59opportunity to get ahead so I'm pleased to be able to work with our caucus in two essential areas that go
06:06to the finance committee one of them is tariffs the others Medicaid but we've got to stay at it and mobilize
06:12Americans in every corner of the country to make sure that people on both health and their budgets which
06:19is what the tariffs are all about they get a more fair shot in the days ahead we're going to stay at it until
06:25they do and as the leader said we now have a bipartisan resolution that's going to build on the cane resolution
06:32but try to accomplish the same thing only for a hundred and eighty nations not just one
06:38and we're not
06:39President Trump ran on a platform to lower Americans costs and instead he is slamming ordinary people
06:51hard-working families with a huge tax on everyday goods let's let's be clear about about what this is
07:00this is a tax on hard-working families these tariffs will be a thirty eight hundred dollar tax increase
07:09on working people I want you to think about that and the implications of that at a time when a third of
07:17all Americans have only five hundred dollars in their savings account and so people will literally
07:25be crushed by what is happening in real time I can tell you that as I talked to Georgians they want
07:33help they want a government that understands the challenges of ordinary people they want to help paying for
07:40their groceries they're concerned about price of saving and buying a house and buying a car make no
07:50mistake tariffs will only raise costs and make life harder for middle-class people and for hard-working families
07:57ironically the president who ran on a platform to lower people's costs is taxing hard-working people middle-class people
08:09the working poor while at the same time they are laser focused on giving a tax cut to the riches of the rich
08:18I think that's wrong-headed I think it's Robin Hood in reverse they're stealing from the poor in order to give to the rich
08:24in order to give to the rich and the people of Georgia and all across our country deserve better than this in contrast my
08:35colleagues and I are focused on lowering costs and that's why tomorrow I'm proud that I'll be joining
08:42Senator Bennett to introduce the American Family Act which would put money back into the pockets of families by nearly doubling the
08:53child tax credit three months after I arrived here in the Senate I'm very proud that in the American
08:58Rescue Plan one of the first things I was able to do was to deliver on the expanded child tax credit it
09:05literally cut child poverty almost in half but we only did it for six months because we could not get it
09:12extended we need to reorder our priorities in this institution we need to pass tax relief for children
09:22and for the families that are raising these children and we mean we need to make sure that the wealthy pay their fair share
09:31Congress has a role in it and my Republican colleagues need to decide are they standing with
09:37Donald Trump and co-president Elon Musk are they standing with ordinary people
09:45President Obama just one more point one more point I heard that Senator Thune said a few minutes ago that he and
09:52Speaker Johnson are speaking different languages but neither of them are speaking the language of the American
09:58people who want lower costs who don't want to see tax breaks for billionaires and want to see Medicaid and other vital
10:06programs kept
10:08leadership we have decades of trade deals that have not brought down our trade imbalances with many many countries that has put our factories, our workers, our farmers at a disadvantage. How would you address this problem without causing all of these damaging effects?
10:27We have not seen such a chaotic across the board and highly well let me say it again. We have not seen something as chaotic and as damaging across the board as this trade deal in decades. It's going to be devastating for the American economy and the world economy.
10:46Senator Schirmer, are you seeing any evidence that this economic chaos as you describe it is moving the political needle in the Senate battleground states whether it be Maine or North Carolina?
10:58We are seeing it move the political needle across the country because people have less and less faith in Donald Trump's handling of the economic policies of this country plain and simple. We're seeing it in just about every state and the numbers continue to get worse for him and will continue to get worse for him.
11:15But the numbers aren't what's important. It's what the American people feel and the American people feel that he is not paying attention to their needs. They want lower costs. He's raising their costs. They want the billionaires to pay their fair share. He wants to cut them. They want health care. He's cutting that. Yes.
11:33When Republicans are asked to defend the tariffs they say that this is what Donald Trump supporters voted for in every rally he was talking about tariffs and that he should be given the deference to make these trade deals and this pain is only temporary that this is what the American people say to that.
11:48I say the American people are speaking already and they don't like what they're seeing. They're anxious. They're worried. And they're worried about the chaos of what Trump is doing in addition to worrying about how deep these tariffs house how high these tariffs go in terms of causing them. He never outlined a policy like this. Yes.
12:07How are Democrats going to use the recess to message about these tariffs and do you think that former Senator Menendez deserves a pardon.
12:14Okay. The bottom line is that how Democrats are going to use you're going to see us talking. We are working. Hakeem and I are Senate and House colleagues are going to be out there talking to the people during the recess all the time on the issue of tariffs on the issue of Medicaid on the issue of taxes on the issue of Social Security. We have days planned where we're working on all these issues.
12:37Did you want to answer something? No, I was just going to say we also got a tax bill coming up that can help bring industry back from overseas by making it more attractive to do business in the United States rather than overseas. Look at the Pfizer report. A few years ago, Pfizer paid no taxes in the United States. They basically went and did business overseas. That's the kind of idea that the Democrats have.
13:04the Democrats have. Thank you.
13:07Do you believe that former Senator Menendez needs a pardon?
13:08I'll give you.