Leader Jeffries on MS NOW's Velshi

For more on this, I'm joined by New York Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, the top Democrat in the House of Representatives. Congressman Jeffries, good to see you. Thank you for being with us this morning. Good morning. Great to be with you. Everything about this war, forgetting the part that it seems to have been badly thought out and badly planned and all of that, it is illegal. It is not permitted for the United States to enter into war without either an authorization of the use of military force or explicit permission from Congress. What do you do about the fact that that simply hasn't happened? Whether you like the war with Iran or not, or you hate the Islamic regime, it doesn't matter. This is not a legal war. Well, we brought a raw powers resolution to the floor of the Congress that fell a few votes short when we were in session earlier this month. Upon our return, we'll continue to do the same thing. The president has failed to make the case to the American people and to their representatives in Congress. And that is one of the reasons why, of course, this war of choice is deeply unpopular. The American people want their taxpayer dollars spent to make their lives more affordable. Instead, the administration, of course, is spending billions of dollars to drop bombs in the Middle East when Donald Trump, as candidate Trump, promised not to get us involved in this type of conflict. You said that the administration failed to make the case to Congress. One might say that one could try to make the case to Congress, and Congress could say you didn't make the case well enough. I would assume that some of your Republican colleagues would say you didn't even attempt to make the case. The legal part of this is you've got to actually come and try and tell us about that. Why wouldn't Republicans have joined hands with Democrats, and why did a handful of Democrats not support this? Well, you know, you'll have to talk to those individual Democrats who made a decision to not support the prior war powers resolution, although several of them have indicated that the next time we bring such a resolution to the floor, they will be prepared to support it. In terms of Republicans, what's clear is that from the very beginning of the Trump presidency, these extremists have functioned like wholly owned subsidiaries of the Trump cartel, continuing to be nothing more than reckless rubber stamps for Donald Trump's extreme agenda, as opposed to functioning like a separate and co-equal branch of government. And what is clear to me is that Donald Trump's war of choice that Republicans are supporting was poorly planned. There was no plan as it relates to dealing with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. There was no plan as it relates to evacuating thousands of Americans who for days after the conflict was stranded, there were no plans to deal with the fact that Iran was going to strike out at our allies in the Gulf states throughout the region. And now this war has intensified, so more than a dozen countries are actually involved. And there's no clear plan to end this conflict in a way that ignores to the benefit of the national security interests of the American people. I'm hoping this war is not continuing in November when the election is on, the midterms are on, and in January when the new Congress is formed. But is there something you can do if and when you take control of Congress to immediately stop this war if it's going on and immediately impose a requirement on this administration that they cannot go into war without the permission of Congress? Well, certainly it would be our hope that this would resolve itself way earlier than November or January of next year, as you've indicated, Ali. But the one thing that is clear is that Democrats, in taking back control of the House and or that the congressional requirement of approval of an act of war, particularly one that continues to sustain itself now for weeks, is vindicated and brought to life. And that certainly would be our intention. Listen, as Democrats, we need to reclaim the institution of Congress as a separate and co-equal branch of government, because Republicans have decided that they just want to hand over our authority on behalf of the American people to Donald Trump and the sycophants that are filled within his administration and his cabinet. And so, listen, our focus has got to be on the issues that matter for the American people. And that's our promise to everyday Americans, that we're going to focus on driving down the high cost of living, focus on fixing our broken health care system, focus on making sure that immigration enforcement in this country is fair and just and humane, and focus on making sure that the taxpayer dollars of the American people are actually spent to make their quality of life better. So let's talk about that. You mentioned the price of gas, $3.67 now. It's up 25 percent or something since before the war. Price of oil itself is up 40 percent, and gas always follows that. So the average American is now going to be paying probably 40 percent more for a gallon of gas. Then they'll pay surcharges for everything that they order that UPS or Amazon has to deliver, every flight they take, for every company that ships things, for farmers who have to pay more for diesel, for farmers who have to pay more for fertilizer. And then there's the $2 billion a day that this war is costing that is not going toward the things that we need. So we can't give health care subsidies to people, but we can spend $2,000 on a war that nobody explains to us. From an affordability perspective, this fits right into what should be Democratic messaging. Well, that's absolutely correct. Listen, our view is that Donald Trump and Republicans have taken affirmative steps to make life more unaffordable for the American people, when these are people who promised these extremists, these Republicans, to lower the high cost of living on day one. And of course, costs aren't going down. They've gone up. The Trump tariffs have increased costs on everyday Americans by thousands of dollars per year. Republicans refused to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits, causing dramatic increases in health insurance premiums for more than 20 million Americans directly and tens of millions of other Americans indirectly who receive their insurance from their employers. We've also seen Republicans make the affirmative decision to enact the largest cut to Medicaid in American history, to cut SNAP by $186 billion, which is making food more unaffordable for the American people. And of course, as a result of this war of choice, this reckless war that Donald Trump and Republicans have launched, we're seeing gas prices increase through the roof. And that's already on top of electricity bills that have been skyrocketing because of the Republican attack on the clean energy economy. And so Republicans have affirmatively made life more expensive for the American people, and Democrats plan to do everything that we can to reverse that. When a special election in Maine last year, last week, over a state seat, a Democrat flipped a Republican seat to Democrat. That's the 28th seat that's been flipped so far. Republicans have flipped no legislative seats, state legislative seats, since the last election. What are you reading into this? What are you hearing about that in terms of the effect that it's going to have on primaries and the midterms? Well, Democrats have effectively won every single meaningful election for 15 consecutive months at this point in time. The American people are rejecting Republican extremism and embracing our focus on actually doing the things necessary to drive down the high cost of living and ensure that every single American who works hard and plays by the rules can actually live an affordable life, a comfortable life, or live the good life. And we've been very clear on what that means. A good paying job, good housing, good health care, good education for your children. And then when it's all said and done, a good retirement. And we're going to continue to keep our foot on the gas pedal, to focus on the things that matter for the American people, to lay out a clear, forward-looking agenda in advance of November. And it's my expectation we're going to take back control of the House. Democratic Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, House Minority Leader, thank you for joining us this morning. We appreciate your time. Thank you so much. And by the way, when I was talking about that special election, it was New Hampshire.