Duckworth on Democrats’ new majority and what comes next

Welcome in. Now at eight, voters have given Democrats control of Congress. The midterm election saw seven flip Senate seats, and that blue wave is still rolling. We want to send it over to Anthony to get reaction from one of the country's most respected senators. Hi, Anthony. Indeed, Liz. We are coming off an historic midterm election night that has completely reshaped the balance of power in Washington. And joining us now to discuss What this newly won majority means for the country, the future, the legislative agenda is the soon to be senior senator from Illinois, Senator Tammy Duckworth. Welcome in. Thank you. It's good to be here. How are you feeling? I am astounded. I'm proud, but you know, I am also ready to get to work. That's really what last night was all about is the American people telling us that they need us to make their lives better. We will talk about your agenda in just a moment, but to what do you attribute this blue, we're calling it a tsunami. Yeah, it is literally people being confronted every day by cost of livings that are sky high. They just want their lives to be better, and right now they're not. And so they want the war in Iran ended, they want gas prices to come down, they want to be able to afford a home. All of those things came together with general dissatisfaction with the way the country was going. Talk about getting back to work, so let's talk about it. With the House and the Senate now both in Democratic hands, what is the very first piece of legislation you want to see brought to the Senate floor? Well, before we even get to January when we actually take control, which we don't, right? They're still in charge. We still have the lame duck session. Right. There are a couple pieces of legislation that I really want to get to work on. Number one, we need to end the war in Iran. And I have legislation I've already written that would do that. If you can end the war in Iran immediately, that will help bring gas prices down. The second thing is we have to rescue our hospitals. The cuts to Medicaid that are in the big ugly bill, I call it, there's the next round will take effect in December. Illinois, for example, is set to lose 93 nursing homes and nine safety net hospitals if we don't reverse those cuts. So we have to work on getting Republicans to agree to reverse those cuts while they're still in power. And if it doesn't happen by December, we will do it. in January. So it sounds like you are really focused on business right now. A lot of people are speculating that these next two years could involve a lot of hearings, a lot of ethics investigations, perhaps some impeachment hearings. What are your thoughts there? Listen, I voted multiple times to impeach Donald Trump, but my focus right now is on making people's lives better. We will do the investigations, we will collect the data. In fact, every day, Illinoisans were collecting data and video of all of the egregious actions by ICE in the cities and on our streets. We're gonna gather that information, but in the meantime, I have to bring gas prices down. People right now are choosing between do I put gas in my car to get to work or do I buy medicine? Or do I pay for food? And we have to make people's lives better immediately. How do we accomplish that then, okay, with so much discord and disagreement and just it seems like these parties are so far away from one another. You have a Republican in the White House, the Trump administration, you got Democrats in control of both houses now. How does anything get done? He says he's gonna be Mr. Veto. Well, he can try to be Mr. Veto, but the bottom line is we've had Republicans vote with us. Before, on ending the war in Iran, now they were so afraid of him that they flipped their votes, right? Tillis, Collins, these folks voted in the right way to end the war, but then they flipped their votes. Maybe they're gonna be less afraid of him now than they were before. We'll see what happens, but we certainly have to put this in front. Of the Senate in front of the House, get it passed. And then if Donald's gonna veto it, American people will know who's vetoing making their lives better every single day. Do you see that power and influence of President Trump on his Republican colleagues out there waning? Significantly after what happened last night? Well, I hope so, but I don't know. I don't know how afraid they are of him. All I can do is do my job for the people of Illinois and the people of this country and I'm gonna do everything I can to save our hospitals. Again, the Illinois Hospital Association says if we don't reverse these Medicaid cuts, we can lose as many as nine safety net hospitals in just our state alone. People can't afford to have their hospitals shut down. I have to ask you about Pete Hegseth, okay, the Secretary of Defense here. You've been one of his most outspoken critics. Should he be impeached and would you be on board with that? Absolutely, but, but, That impeachment cannot stop the work of making people's lives better. First and foremost, bring down gas prices. First and foremost, making housing more affordable. First and foremost, let's end the war in Iran and bring our troops home. Those are the things that have to happen. We will do the investigations. That will be ongoing. We have to hold these people and the graft and the corruption, the incompetence, we have to hold them accountable. That is also part of our democracy. But in the meantime, we can't let the hard work of Representing the people and making their lives better. We can't put that on hold. That needs to come first. I want to dive in a little bit deeper while we have you here about an effort to end the war in Iran. This election last night will give you and your colleagues a lot more control over the purse strings when it comes to funding this war. How do you achieve that? How do you wind things down, get gas prices down, as you said? I already wrote that law. Let's hear more about it. Get people updated. I already wrote that amendment. It is the amendment to the defense budget. And my language just says no more money for the war in Iran and no more money for Pete He gets the travel until they come and speak to the American people and explain what their plan is, how they're going to end the war. And what the reason was for the war to begin with. So we can cut off that funding tomorrow if Leader Thun would allow us to have that vote. And in fact, we did have a vote on stopping the war in Iran, and we did have Republicans vote with us. And then they held the same vote just hours later, and those same Republicans who were so afraid of Donald Trump reversed their votes. So you're thinking this could live to see another day? Absolutely. I'm going to keep introducing it. All right. One issue really affecting Chicagoans, particular ICE operations. We've been talking about the estimated economic impact on restaurants and things like that back here locally for your constituents here. Given what happened, could more protections be put in place with regard to that kind of thing, immigration enforcement? Oh, absolutely. And we have to go after the incompetence that exists in ICE right now. And I have legislation that talks about Empowering local law enforcement to do investigations into ISIS misbehavior and what they've done and their egregious acts. So I have that legislation again, all of these legislation that would. Put limits on a runaway executive branch is written. We have legislation that John Lewis Voting Rights Act. We have the Equality Act. We have legislation that would restore women's reproductive health care. Legislation would put real guardrails around Homeland Security and ICE in particular. We just never had the reins to put those things on the floor for a vote. Come January, we'll be able to do that. I mentioned off the top of the interview, you're about to become Illinois' senior senator. Colleague, about to join you in Washington. We're talking about Juliana Stratton here. What is your advice to her? Oh, you know, she's not going to need a lot of advice. She's going to be my partner, and I'm so excited. I want to just put a pin in something really briefly. Thank you very much. I think it's very fitting that the state that sent the first black woman to the United States Senate and Kari Mosley Braun is sending, it's also going to be the first state in the nation to send two women of color. And that says a lot about the power of inclusivity and the power of what is happening here in Illinois. I'm so proud to be part of that. But Julianna and I have already been working together for. Quite a number of years now, for example, on maternal mortality rates, on, we call it the momnibus, on maternal health. So we're going to continue that work. Senator Duckworth, thank you very much for joining us this morning, being here in studio and talking to us for, hey, nine minutes is a long time in our world, so we appreciate your time. Thank you. Thanks, Senator.