Ra Khan presents a silicone valley in the house where he is a member of progressive coaches. He is a key strategist for Democrats. We asked him about the immediate task of protecting democracy, and then a long -term labor voter wine project who abandoned the Democratic Party and helped to make Trump to the president.
This interview was edited and thickened – you can listen to full interview Here.
John Winer: Last week the house narrowly passed the previous budget. What’s the bill?
Ro Khanna: Well, look, the republican budget is a tough, hard budget – 2 trillion. Dollars reduction of Medicaid. They are mostly going to put a cap on the per capita in each state. What does that mean? If you live in California, my state, or you live in Ohio, your state will get less money for Medicaid. This means that millions of people will not be covered, especially in accordance with the law on accessible care that has expanded the lighting. This means that rural hospitals will close. This means that outpatient mental health services, behavioral therapy will close.
And why do they all do it? To finance tax benefits for billionaires because they believe that a billionaire class is what is moving forward. The fact that they are somehow is a society, and the rest of us really don’t matter. I voted “no”.
JW: Many of our friends say, “It is great that the Democrats have united in the vote” No “. We thank you for it. But it’s not just vote “no“ right now. We need guys to do everything we can to stop it. “I know what you feel the same. What are you doing except voting” no “?
RK: I will tell you what I was doing today except voting “No”: I convened a press conference on ZOOM with 15 federal workers who were fired. A number of them were Trump’s voters. They said they voted for Trump just a few months ago, but now they no longer support it because their work was eliminated. These were veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, people who helped other veterans with mental health, people who helped veterans get banking services, and people who helped in national parks.
I think our biggest work is to raise the stories of ordinary Americans who have suffered from the brutal and irrational policy of this administration. Trump creates a federal government that looks like a private stock company: cut, cut, cut, ask questions later. That’s what the working and middle classes are. You can’t be pro -American and “America first” and hate workers when 99 percent of Americans work for life.
In my opinion, this is the most effective form of repelling back. And it works. The number of Donald Trump has fallen for the first time, which is less than 50 percent of the economy. It has never been below 50 percent, even if Biden knocked him into his first term, so we need to do more.
JW: By referring to a long -term work class project: you prefer to restore American production to the top priority. And you recently wrote in New York Times OP-ED, “Economic Enlargement of Workers’ Opportunities should be not one of the many issues interested in Democrats but our defining reason.” Please explain what that means.
RK: I call it a “new economic patriotism”. It’s pretty simple. For the first of all, it must be said that people who act the way we rescuers must say: “We are scared. We are those who pursue a policy that has thrown the working and middle class.”
Of course, this started with Republicans in Reagan, with huge tax benefits for very wealthy and economics. But it is also the Democrats who supported bad trade transactions, NAFTA, the World Trade Organization, China’s ascension. Democrats who supported the elimination of industries with private capital and observation of the corporate greed industry industry. And we had no strategy for people who were affected by globalization and digitizing. So, we must now say that we will achieve the economic success of each community in America and the economic prosperity of each family of our main priority.
JW: What are the steps, what are the politicians, what new laws do we need for this?
RK: We are going to create a National Council for Economic Development, which focuses on deindustrized places and get new production there – whether it is a new steel factory, whether it is a new aluminum plant, whether new shipbuilding – to become a production superpower again. But not just the product. We will look: What new jobs we can have? What are the new jobs in the technology we can have there? How do we create economic power in places that do not bloom today because they have been neglected and abandoned? And then, how can we make sure that every American has medical care, has children, has no education without charge? Life in America is too expensive and too hard, and we can tax to billionaires in my area to do something with it.
JW: We believe that the Silicon Valley as a Trump support database, but in fact the Democrats have carried a silicone valley every time.
RK: I say this again and again: if I can be taxing billionaires and survived nine years of the election in the richest area of the world, I don’t understand how 434 other Congress members may not be for that. If I will be able to win the 35 points in the Silicon Valley for the rich taxation, you can win in any area on the rich tax platform to pay for medical care, education, children of each American.
JW: And you were a supporter of Bernie Sanders.
RK: When I was the chairman of the Bernie Sanders, mostly 2020, I delivered my area to Bernie Sanders. There are many people who support Bernie Sanders from very progressive areas. But I believe that the novelty in my case is that I support the Sanders policy – Medicare for all, as well as the free state college, as well as wages, as well as support trade unions – I do it in the richest area of the country, the area with 12 trillion. Dollars. Revenue inequality is such a big problem, but if you can get a county with billionaires in Silicon Valley, which supports progressive policy, it can become a majority coalition.
And this is what we need after Trump: economic transformation, not a return to the status quo, not a return to a democratic administration that failed to increase wages that did not receive any childcare policy that failed to raise taxes but a truly progressive, transformation, new administration.
JW: This is the 2028 election agenda. Between the time, what are your priorities?
RK: Well, one, I’m going to go to the red areas in California, and then maybe further. I really touched what Sanders did (Speech by Swing, which chose Republicans at the house in 2024.). Again, Sanders demonstrates the intellectual leadership for the party, pointing to Amakh last week, and then shown in the city of Iowa, as well as in other red areas, given the case of the cruelty of these cuts.
I will also continue to cover the stories of people affected by mass firing. I call it a “massacre for Valentine’s Day” because all these people were notified on Valentine’s Day. It shows the cruelty and indifference of this administration.
And then I will introduce strategic legislation to cause Trump’s hypocrisy. For example, today I presented “without gifts for the lobby bill. Trump said he was going to drain the swamp, but the first thing he did was a return order by Biden, saying that the White House officials could take gifts from the lobby. We must be a party anti -corruption.
JW: Finlly, what is the big picture where we are now?
RK: Look, it’s a dark section, but I want people to be optimistic about the restoration of this nation and what is going on. When we had great depression and this dark chapter in American history, FDR followed it; If we had robbery barons from 1870 to 1900s and ransom, which undermined the reconstruction and brought Jim Kroh, then a progressive era passed; When we had a civil war, there was a renovation and 13th, 14th and 15 amendments. In America, in the times of deep despair and darkness, we were blessed to re -remake a transformation, positive vision. And this is what we should focus on as progressive – that the end of the Trump administration will mark the beginning of modern progressive age.
