CNN "State of the Union with Jake Tapper" - Transcript Interview with Ayanna Pressley

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Joining me now, a frequent target of the president, Democratic Congresswoman from Massachusetts Ayanna Pressley. Congresswoman Pressley, thanks so much for joining us.

I do want to take a moment to start with the death of Congressman and civil rights icon John Lewis.

You broke barriers by becoming your commonwealth's first black congresswoman. What example, what leadership, what mentoring did Congressman Lewis offer to you?

REP. AYANNA PRESSLEY (D-MA): Well, I consider myself inordinately blessed, while feeling simultaneously robbed. I know we had him for 80 years, but you just can't have enough of that goodness.

And, certainly, I consider myself to be a beneficiary of his activism. There would be no Ayanna Pressley and countless others were it not for John Lewis, the conscience and the compass of our Congress, but, I could argue, for our nation.

And it is especially painful to lose a justice seeker and a man with the moral clarity of John Lewis, against the backdrop at a new moment of racial reckoning in this country, when you see police states like what's happening in Portland, unrest all around us, voter intimidation and suppression tactics.

It is especially acute and painful to be losing him.

TAPPER: Indeed.

And amidst this racial reckoning, as you call it, this week, President Trump honed in on an Obama era fair housing law intended to combat segregation. The president is accusing Democrats of wanting to destroy American suburbs.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Your home will go down in value, and crime rates will rapidly rise.

Joe Biden and his bosses from the radical left want to significantly multiply what they're doing now. And what will be the end result is, you will totally destroy the beautiful suburbs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: You happen to represent Boston suburbs. What's your reaction to that?

PRESSLEY: More of the same from -- from Donald Trump and this administration, who sow the seeds of division. And I can't even accuse that, characterize that as a dog whistle. It's so far beyond that.

And so that's why I was hoping the president would not even tweet yesterday about John Lewis. At this point, we don't need anybody's sympathies or tweets. What we need is action. If you really want to honor the life of John Lewis, you don't do

things like gut the fair housing laws. You don't sow the seeds of division. And you don't delay bringing the Voting Rights Advancement Act, named after John Lewis, to the floor. And that should be brought to the floor immediately.

So, they're in complete contradiction of everything that John Lewis fought for, and they dishonor the blood that he shed on that bridge.

TAPPER: Do you consider that pitch that the president's making there, I think at the White House, not at a campaign rally, do you consider that campaign pitch to be racist?

PRESSLEY: John Lewis said Donald Trump is racist.

So, I don't -- I mean, again, at this point, this is so much bigger than his hateful rhetoric. I'm focused, and not -- and don't allow myself to get distracted. I'm focused on his hateful and hurtful policies.

I represent a district that has been hardest hit by those policies. When it comes to their policies, the cruelty is the point. And when it comes to their culture, the corruption is the point.

I represent a district that is 53 percent people of color, 40 percent foreign-born, where, in a three-mile radius, life expectancy drops by 30 years and median household income by $50,000.

[09:35:03]

So, my district is no anomaly, but it is -- certainly perfectly encapsulates the challenges that we're confronted by as a nation and how policy has created those. And, under this administration, these inequities, disparities and racial injustice is exacerbated.

TAPPER: Congresswoman, let's talk about the difficult decision about whether or not schools should reopen in the fall amidst this pandemic.

A recent poll found that almost a quarter of the families in your commonwealth earn less than $50,000, and they say they have too few devices to participate in online learning.

Additionally, according to Feeding America, food insecurity is expected to increase by 60 percent for those who live in Eastern Massachusetts as a result of the pandemic.

As you know, many low-income families rely on school-provided meals. At what point does the potential negative impact of remote learning on these families, not to mention all the people who can't work because they have to take care of their kids, does that outweigh the risk posed by returning to school?

PRESSLEY: Jake, I represent the Massachusetts 7th Congressional District, the hardest-hit district in our commonwealth, Chelsea, in particular, highest infection rates per capita, Randolph, neighborhoods like Roxbury, Mattapan, and Dorchester in Boston.

I'm in daily conversation with superintendents, with educators, with parents, and with students. And the fear and the trauma is real.

We cannot move too quickly on this. The consequences are too great to consider. This is about the public health.

What needs to happen is, Congress needs to continue to act as the conscience of this nation and to lead, in the absence of this Trump administration, to provide reoccurring payments and to mitigate the financial hardship and the burdens that families are feeling, to continue to address food insecurity. But we should not rush to reopen schools.

And I do want to take a moment to just salute our educators. They have already proven themselves to be courageous and dedicated educators. We're now asking them to be case workers and, in some instances, martyrs. And that is unconscionable.

Again, we need to pass the HEROES Act, which is sitting on the desk of Mitch McConnell, which makes massive federal investments to support the reopening of our schools when it is safe and this virus is under control.

In the meantime, we just reported out an infrastructure bill which makes those investments in broadband and other resourcing, so that we are not contributing to learning loss or to an achievement gap.

TAPPER: Mm-hmm.

PRESSLEY: But our greatest wealth as a nation is our public health. And that needs to be the number one priority.

TAPPER: Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley, Democrat of Massachusetts, thanks for joining us today.

Our thoughts and best wishes are with the people of the commonwealth.

PRESSLEY: Thank you.

TAPPER: Thank you so much for being with us today.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source