County democratic steak fry. We are going to show you some of the comments now beginning with Michael Bennet and former hud secretary, julian cstrastro. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Family here today, iowa democrats, if we do our job, 400 days from today, we can send donald trump back to maralago long,d, and end, the National Nightmare we are facing and save our democracy. I am Michael Bennet and it is great to be here. Thank you. [cheers and applause] i am not a career politician. I was in business saving jobs and then was the superintendent of the Denver Public schools, a large, urban School District where most of the kids live in poverty but have the exact same dreams as my kids. I have been in the Senate Facing tough elections in a purple state. 10 years ago, when i got back to washington, i thought what i would find is the bedrock of our democracy. The government of the people, by the people, and for the people. And instead, what i found was steve king. And mitch mcconnell. Characters cast of who are trying to make Barack Obamas life and absolute misery, destroying our in this exercise of selfgovernment. In the 10 years i have been there, since i have been there, nothing has changed except now we have donald trump. Someone who says Climate Change is a hoax but then iowas windmills are causing cancer. Some say he loves the north Korean Leader but hates our allies like angela merkel. Someone told us that mexico would pay for the wall, but guess what . You are. Someone finds out they cannot soldase greenland but has the white house to polluters and crony capitalists. He did say he would run the government just like one of his businesses and that is the only promise he has kept. Bankrupt. That has anything to do with improving the lives of real americans. Americans. That is something i know a and that is something i know a lot about. Yearsad to sum up the 10 of town halls i have had, it is that people have come and said michael, we are working so hard but we cannot afford some housing, health care, education or higher education. Childhood education, or higher education. For the families that are working two or three jobs, if they were at my town hall they would say, michael, we are killing ourselves, but we cannot get our kids out of poverty. And we have to fix this. Iowa you are hearing a lot of plans from a lot of people. What i hear is how are you going to get it done with other guys back in washington . We need an agenda that is going to unite democrats and the nine that 9 Million People voted twice for barack obama and once for trump. We need to take that agenda to the country, to states like yours and mine and to when tough election so we win the white house, send mcconnell packing and hold onto the house majority. Winning by winning we can finally fix a broken washington. Didnt have to come up with it to run for president. Its an agenda that unites the American People. An agenda that has a real tax cut for the middle class and we cut childhood poverty in america by 40 . Universal health care through public option we can enact in three years, not in 30 years, giving health care in this country and collecting costs. Putting the 70 of kids who never go to college in the position of earning a living wage, not the minimum wage when they graduate from high school, a Climate Change plan that is not just urgent but creates policy that can last a generation and close over and the broken politics. Its good can policy and good politics. I want to tell you, we risk losing if you run on the wrong ideas. Take health care. For families in this country, the stakes couldnt be higher. Think about the hypocrisy of the republicans who kill obamacare. Donald trump telik dachshund Donald Trumps health care is paid for by all of us. Mitch mcconnell pot health care is paid for by all of us. Yet donald trump is the first president to run for president and be president who is literally taking Health Care Away from millions of americans. Democrats fighting for universal health care. Thiss a big difference in race. If you like your health care you can keep it. The party ofme taking away 180 million american. We won the house back in 2018 with democrats running on a public option, not medicare for all. We should follow their lead, thats how they will build a majority. That we need to nominate somebody who runs up races and who says the same thing in the primary that they say in the general election. When i decided to run for president i daughter is standing behind me. If you run, you tell the truth and you lose, no one can fault you for it. I said to her caroline, thats good, there is no other reason for me to run. I was so pleased when i saw the headline on the editorial that said Michael Bennet pounds truth into this Campaign Area that is what we need, iowa. You are all here today to save democracy. The founder of this country did two incredible things. Thats called the revolution. They submitted a constitution for ratification by people who would live under it. They did something terrible, perpetuated human slavery. It took americans took other americans to do their duty. He ran away, he fled, he got to massachusetts, where he met the abolitionists. The abolitionists were arguing at the time the constitution was a proslavery document. Back words exactly you have it exactly backwards, the constitution is an antislavery document, but we are not living up to the word of that constitution. The same thing Martin Luther king says in memphis when he was there for the garbage workers who were striking when he says i am here to make sure america keeps a promise you wrote down on the page. I think our job is exactly the same as that. I think Frederick Douglass and Martin Luther king are just like people are just like the founders, the people that wrote the constitution of the United States. I believe men and women, especially women who fought for the right to vote, who fought for my daughters. I think that children who marched in the streets in america yesterday to pull our attention to the Climate Crisis that we face, i think we are founders to. Youryou think about what responsibility is in this election, you need to think of yourself as a founder. Citizen in job of a a democratic republic. Trump. Ot elect donald we will not elect donald trump again. Iowa democrats, you set the course for the country by voting first. Dont just send the message. Coccus for a candidate who knows how to build a new American Dream. Thats how we are going to beat donald trump he had thank you, iowa for your kindness, for your generosity, for being here today. [applause] hooley and castro served as secretary of housing and urban development under president barack obama. The youngest mayor of the top 50 American City at the time. He worked to expand the promise of opportunity all over the nation. And expanded Internet Access to low income families and public housing. Please join me in welcoming secretary hooley and castro castro. Julian [applause] hello, ill up. Let me begin with a message for our House Democratic friends. Do yourme for you to job and impeach donald trump. How many crimes has your president commit when congress will act an impeachment act and impeach him . Whether we impeach him now or defeat him on november third 2020, there is going to be life after donald trump. Question is, what is that going to look like for a beautiful country . I grew up on the west side of san antonio with a grandmother and a mother and my twin mother that twin brother my twin brother. My grandmother had come over from mexico and she was seven years old, along with her sister. She never finished elementary school. As a singley mom parent and my mom raise my brother and me as a single parent. Like a lot of your families we knew what it was like to struggle, to be able to pay the rent at the first of the month worrying about whether we were able to pay the rent at the first of the month. Think, the two generations after my grandmother got here were almost nothing. The other one is standing here asking for your support to be president of the United States of america. That is america. Road a country country we want to create for every single american. I know in the years to come we need to move forward as one nation, with one destiny, and my vision for the future of our country, america will be the smartest, the healthiest, the fairest and most prosperous nation on earth. If we are going to be the smartest nation on earth and means starting early. It means paying teachers what they deserve and improving your k12 Education System. Jobs require more knowledge and more skilled than ever before. Everybody should have access to with jobucation training certification programs. To be thegoing healthiest nation on earth we need a Different Health care system area my grandmother had type two diabetes. I watched as her condition got worse and worse. That whole time she had medicare. I also believe we need to make sure we have a distinction between physical and Mental Health care and invest in Mental Health care. Then we improve our Health Care System so that rural hospitals can stay open. If we are going to be a fairest nation on earth, it means reforming our justice system. Legalizing marijuana and investing in diversion programs. No matter the color of your skin or how much money you have or what neighborhood you are growing up, you are treated the same. I believe if we are good to be the first nation on earth, we make sure we get equal pay for equal work. To we defend a womans right have an abortion in this country, the womans right to choose. That we passed the equality act sexualatter what the orientation is we cant be discrimination discriminated against. If we are going to be the most prosperous nation on earth, it my First Executive order on my first day in office will be to reenter the Paris Climate Accord so that we lean and ton sustainability follow that up with a green new zeroso we can get to net and create jobs. Nationhe most prosperous on earth means we need to raise the minimum wage to early 15 an hour and support unions. We already need to go above 15 to the minimum wage. E dont have to wait 10 years we need to invest in affordable housing. We need to make sure we have a tax code that rewards people that work for a living. I propose investments for working families and universal childcare, making sure we have Good Health Care and universal prek. We also need to make sure that in the years to come that we invest in jobs, not only big cities and suburbs but in Rural Communities that are hurting in iowa and texas and throughout in United States area did 2016 most of us did not think donald trump was going to win. A lot of us were surprised. His campaign was out to his old tricks. Tricks is tod scapegoat immigrants. No more kids sleeping on the floor. We are going to keep families together. We are going to put undocumented immigrants on a pathway to citizenship. We are going to make sure we treat people with compassion and common sense instead of cruelty. Find safety and opportunity at home instead of having to make a dangerous ifrney to the United States we are going to be donald trump, we are going to have to ensure we go everywhere. I have been doing that in this campaign. We need to create a Diverse Coalition of working people. Thats what im doing. Votes butto get those also get the actual votes to florida. Folks have asked me what is the first thing you would do if you are elected president . I said the first thing i would do on the first day assigned that executive order recommitting to the Paris Climate Accord. In all honesty my fear moment would come a little bit earlier in the day when it is customary for the incoming president to say goodbye to the outgoing with all of Donald Trumps staff lined up around the white house waiting in the distance. I can imagine being there with. Y wife and my daughter getting ready to say goodbye to milani and donald trump. Ready to go getting off to new york or maralago, or somewhere. Will yo in some work. In right before he leaves. Right before he walks away, adios. Adios, adios, adios. You can help make it happen, iowa. Were counting on you to register voters and spread the word. Two beat donald trump on november 3 and say adios in january 2021. Thank you very much. Thank you iowa. Thank you. Thank you. [chanting] [cheering] our next speaker is the first female comments veteran for run for president and one of the first elected to congress. Representative to alter gabbert gabbard has served for 616 years and has served twice in the middle east. Tulsi has served on the Armed Services committees in addition to serving as vice chair of the dnc. She is running to bring a soldiers heart to the white house. Please join me in welcoming congresswoman tulsi gabbard. Hight no mountain enough playing] aloha. Bbard in hawaii when we get gentle showers we consider them blessings. Lessed, grateful to be here to join all of you today at such an important time. I start our conversation with aloha. We are facing increasing divided times. Selfserving politicians in washington who are pitting one group of us against each other, tearing us apart. Now i start with aloha not as a way to say hello, but because there is a very powerful meaning that inspires us in how we can come together. We greet each other with aloha, what were saying is i come to you with an open heart, i come to you with respect, i come to you with love recognizing we are all connected, we are all family, were all children of god. Comealoha inspires us to together, bridge those divides regardless of where we come from. Regardless of who we love or how we worship or if we worship. Aloha is what unites us. I love our country and i love the American People. There is so much that brings us together, the values of the principles and the freedoms enshrined within our constitution. These are the things that bring us together. These are the things we are fighting for. Rereadecently, recently abraham lincolns gettysburg address where he spoke very briefly and very clearly about the great sacrifice that was made on those battlefields about the new nation that was born, dedicated to the proposition that we are all created equal of. That weout the best way as people can honor the great sacrifice that was made. Must ensurehow mwe we have a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Is that the government we have today . No. Rep. Gabbard its not. We have not carried out that vision that lincoln had for us. Instead we have a government of, by and for the rich and powerful. We, the people, are left behind as a. Result we, the people, and of struggling and. Suffering as a result. Willeserve a president who fight for you, who will put your wellbeing ahead of the interests of profit, put people ahead of politics, put the wellbeing of the American People in our country at the forefront. Im running for president to bring these values , the heart of every service members, to restore the principal and integrity and honor and respect to the presidency. As your president i will crack down on big pharma and Big Insurance Companies and make sure that every single american gets the health care they need. Im going to make sure that education of our kids is a priority, that we pay our teachers what they deserve and we make sure that our kids have every opportunity for their lives. Onill end the failed war drugs, end the federal marijuana prohibition and bring about real criminal justice reform. In a broken system that is torn far too many families apart and has cost the American People so much. Ill tackle Climate Change. I first got involved with politics, i first ran for office in hawaii when i was 21 years old running for the state house because of a desire to protect our planet. To make sure that we have clean water to drink and clean air to breathe. Together we can usher in a new green century, harnessing all the innovation and technology has to offer us, to make sure we are protecting our planet, creating good just, transitioning off of fossil fuels and truly investing in our future. Now, there is an issue that essential to all these other issues and the issue is the cost of war. The cost of war. It is something that, as a soldier, i know all too well in a deeply personal way. I served on two deployments in the middle east and my first appointment was to iraq during the height of the war. I served in a field medical unit where every single day we were confronted with that high human cost of war. Ive served in congress for seven years on the Foreign Affairs committee, the Homeland Security committee. I understand the importance of our national security. Deeply painful the terrible loss is for the of thousands of. Families who never got to welcome their loved ones home from these wasteful regime change wars that have undermined her national security, that have cost of such painandsuffering in the countries where we wage these wars, and that have caused every single one of us as taxpayers trillions of dollars since 9 11 alone. What does that mean . Trillions of dollars. Every single dollar that has been spent on these