The nba. But High Schoolers and even third graders are following the nfl players like Colin Kaepernick and Michael Bennett. And later, senator cory booker gained prominence as americas most hands on big city mayor. Now the democrat from new jersey is working hard to become a hero to millions fighting the trump agenda. Here is your thoughts on health care, american race relations, and whether or not hes running for president. But first, only a year after then candidate donald trump asked africanamericans what they had to lose by voting for him, we now know theres plenty at stake under his presidency. Its against this backdrop that the Congressional Black Caucus met this week for the first legislative conference of the trump era. Joining me is cbc member and congressman gregory meeks, democrat of new york. And jason johnson, politics editor of the root and professor at morgan state university. Congressman meeks, you and i go way back. We even took a knee when there was a Police Killing in new york in 99 and were arrested together with the former mayor standing up to mr. Trumps friend rudy giuliani. Now we see people taking knees in a nonviolent protest asking america to deal with racial inequality and the president calls them sobs. Calls them mothers a name. Now this is a president that said they would fine people among neonazis because people sobs for nonviolent protests calling attention to racial disparities. How does the congress, the democrats in the congress, the black caucus respond to that . I mean i think you should take a knee at the next state of the Union Address or walk out like he said to walk out on the players. I mean, how do you respond to this and what are you going do about it . You know, rev, there is great dialogue, number one. I, for one, going to be boycotting the white house, thats for sure. I think all good will people, black, white, red, yellow, brown, this president is an absolute disgrace for what this country is and all that it has gained. And every time he opens his mouth you really understand when he says he wants to make america go back to where america was. Because america has been made great because of protests like from dr. Martin luther king jr. Like from athletes like ali. Then he changed his name and people called him disrespectful to kareem abduljabbar. We cannot go back to those times. We cannot be silent. I think its incumbent upon members of congress and the Congressional Black Caucus to make sure that our voices are loud and clear. That we continue to do what we have been doing in promoting legislation that will be beneficial to all americans. But, you know, taking care of those who are africanamericans and those who have been victimized by Police Brutality and others. And, yes, well be talking about strategies that we will undertake when we get back into session. No. I think there has to be a dramatic were doing it as weve done not only in the past but in the recent future. I mean in recent present rather. Like around the Trayvon Martin case and others. Because really were calling for attention on the issues. And what is so to me so distracting is the president ought to be addressing the issues of inequality rather than distracting us with name calling. Deal with what theyre protesting about, mr. President. And thats why i said the talkous and othecaucus and others should take a knee and we should force them to deal with the educational inequality and inequality in the criminal Justice System congressman meeks, not just to call people names or their mothers names. Deal with your policies. I agree with you. I dont know if this president has the intelligence to deal with it. He is clearly not put people around. Look at the people he put in for secretary of education who doesnt understand education. Climate change is out. I dont know if we have the first incompetent president of my time, thats for sure, and the only one that i know. I dont know if hes competent enough to deal with those issues. When i look at how hes what he said at the u. N. And on the world stage and as i listen to World Leaders around, there is a question of his competency. And if this was any other country, what we should be calling for is a recall election in which the American People and i think the majority of American People who did not vote for him in the first place, if we were in a parliamentary procedure, we would be calling for a call vote right now so we can get rid of the president and have another election and particularly on top of the fact that when we keep digging into these investigations and showing his connection to russia and others that was involved in this, there should be a recall election. And so i think that, yes, i think theres got to be something to demonstrate to the world that weregoing to be silent and just sit back and that we will take action. And i would hope its not just africanamericans. Right. Its all good people should be more than just africanamericans. This is not an after condition american issue. This is an issue of people gf will and people who love this country to stand up for. Now, jason, i think thats critical that this is not just africanamericans that ought to be standing up. It should be people of all races. It should be whites, blacks, and i think weve tried to demonstrate that from the 60s and the Civil Rights Movement of that era all the way to recent thousand ministers march where it ended up 5,000 showing collective here. But also keeping the focus not on the protests but on what were protesting for. Because what i keep emphasizing is lets not let those that are suffering get lost in the drama between stars and the president. There are people actually suffering. That ought to be the priority and thats what were taking a knee to dramatize. Well, yeah. I agree. And onest things black, white, you know whatever, hispanic, latino, asian this is important. Remember the man lost the popular vote. Like the majority of people. And that was a Multicultural Coalition that voted for Hillary Clinton that we dont really want this man who is a white supremacist who has a history after buzing women. Most people did not want him to be president of the United States. I think this is critical. When it comes to what we all think is probably going to end up happening today, when hundreds and i just saw a tweet this morning that the entire offensive line of the soon to be vegas raiders, the oakland raid serz going to take a knee, youre going have people taking knees all throughout. Keet to this like marches and anything else is what happens next . Every single one of the guys going say lets register to vote. Are all of the players, remember, there are elections in new jersey. Theres elections in virginia this year. As long as this activism manifests itself and changes on the ground. A lot of the players give money. Thats great. Too many people dont do. That but if it turns into voting this fall, that is a kind of long term change we want to see. Other than that, it just becomes symbol and we need the victims which are millions of the people talking about millions. Congressman, quickly whashgsz going quickly, whats going to happen with health care . Does john mccain saying hes not going to support it, does it kill it . What are you hearing from the Upper Chamber . Im hearing the votes are not there. That as john mccain maze his decision and the other two senators. And, you know, september is the deadline. All good americans look and talk and they support those who are voting no because they are disastrous to end the Affordable Care act. All right. Thank you, congressman greg meeks and jason johnson. And lets take a knee. But then get up and do some work. Coming up, senator cory booker on his fight for your health care. Human rights and running for president some day. Maybe. This is politics nation on msnbc. Oh, you brought butch. Yeah butch growls at man hes looking at me right now, isnt he . Yup. butch barks at man butch is like an old soul that just hates my guts. laughs vo you can never have too many faithful companions. Introducing the allnew crosstrek. Love is out there. Find it in a subaru crosstrek. Hes on his way to work in alaska. This is john. Hes on his way to work in new mexico. Willie and john both work for us, a business that employs over 90,000 people in the u. S. Alone. We are the cocacola company, and we make much more than our name suggests. Were an organic tea company. A premium juice company. Weve got drinks for long days. For birthdays. For turning over new leaves. And all of our products rely on the same thing we all do. Clean water. Which is why we have john leading our efforts to replenish every drop of water we use. We believe our business thrives when our communities thrive. Which is just one of the reasons we help make college a reality for thousands of students. Today, Companies Need to do more. So john and willie are trying to do just that. Thank you for listening. Were listening too. We are the tv doctors of america, and we may not know much about medicine, but we know a lot about drama. From scandalous romance, to ridiculous plot twists. gasping son . Dad we also know you can avoid drama by getting an annual checkup. So were partnering with cigna to remind you to go see a real doctor. Go, know, and take control of your health. It could save your life. Doctor poses dad cigna. Together, all the way. Its no stretch to call cory booker one of the faces of the democratic partys future. And his legislative priorities play like a road map for where the party is headed. He cosigned senator Bernie Sanders proposed medicare for all legislation. He vowed to help Daca Recipients fight deportation and hes leading the foupush to remove statues of confederate leaders from the u. S. Capitol. Plus, he wants and overhaulst criminal Justice System. I got to speak with senator booker this week about almost all of this starting with the democrats fight against another republican push to overhaul the countrys health care system. Thank you for being us with, senator. Its always good to be with you, man, whether it is seeing new public or private. Thank you for your voice. Thank you. Let me go to a concern that is really touching many, many probably most americans and that is the health care situation. We see the republicans have come with a new proposal. We see that senator sanders has raised the single pair plan thats being debated. Some feel its ill timed. Where are you in term of predicting where this Health Care Vote will go . Will the senate get 50 votes . Is it the wrong time for the senate from a democratic leader perspective to be debating single pair what gives a foil to senator graham . Look, i think the time is always right to talk about a vision for the future. There is no harm in that. But everybody here, every member of the Democratic Caucus knows that right now what we need to be focused on is protecting and defending o fordable care act. And actually Affordable Care act and working in a bipartisan manner to make it better which we had going on. Senators alexander, republican senator as well as senator patty murray, a democrat, had the right process going. They were having hearings and inviting in experts, doctors, nurses. And then you have graham casting this newest version of trump care being brought forward. The bipartisan effort stopped and now theyre threatening of all the iterations this is actually the worst. And youre seeing what makes it worse, senator . We keep hearing that. What makes it worse . Theyre saying were going to cover people with preexisting conditions. What makes this worse . Well, a lie is a lie is a lie. We know that there are not going to cover preexisting conditions when they do two things, one is to tell the states that they can opt out of it. And then also when you have the mandate and it means that Insurance Companies will have a difficult time affording to offer the kind of insurance plans that we want to see out there. So theyre going to be petitioning states for relaxation of those plans. That provide essential benefits for everything from Maternity Care all the way to a parody between Mental Health and physical health. This is a lie what theyre saying. It is also worse because its a complete changing of a 52year program. Its no the just rolling back at fordable care act. Its actually changing medicaid as we know it. So this is the time. Reverend, i love this is sunday. Folks are going out there and to pray and this is a moral moment for . . Lkj our country. We have to pray that this thing fails. But this is the moment right now that all of us have to be taking actions to make sure this crass cruel bill that will hurt all of america especially denying tens of millions of People Insurance coverage or giving them junk covera coverage, we have to work really hard this week. Dont sit on the sidelines. This is not a spectator sport. Be one of the people that is throughout fighting for the prevention of this plan passing. Senator booker, you are preaching this morning. You sound like your minister david jefferson. I want to get to daca. But before i do, since you started talking about faith and preaching, it reminds me of the ministers march that reverend jefferson and others helped me organize a few weeks ago and there is the moral question. It was in light of the continued problems that we see around racial justice, charlottesville coming out of that and the whole situation with st. Louis that were still reacting to. At this point, we saw former fbi director comey went to howard and received the less than enthusiastic reaction. How do we deal with the continued fight for equality and fairness in terms of the criminal Justice System . And how do we deal with race relations, period . Because you have pointed out and have been on the ground doing some things around environmental bias and environmental racism. How do we deal with all of these issues and how do we deal with this in this era of donald trump who seems in in many ways to trf anything further divide and polarize . First of all, im tired of people who feel somewhat inhibited by talking about these issues because of republican claims of identity politics and theyre talking about identity politics. What identity politics is what donald trump has been doing from the beginning of his campaign when he made his campaign so much focused on muslims and mexicans and using dog whistles, thats identity politics. But pointing out that we are not living consistently with the values that we all share, the ideals of liberty and justice for all or what it says on the supreme court, equal justice under the law, and so to ignore the gravity of america we live in, the biggest cancer on the soul of our country is that we have a criminal Justice System that is so deeply biassed against the poor, against the sick, and against people of color. Theres no difference, reverend. You know this. There is no difference in america in drug usage or drug selling between africanamericans and whites. Look, i went to stanford university, a whole lot of drug use going on. There a whole lot of drug reigns so people can get their pot or ecstasy or aderol. But the targeting of folks, africanamericans are almost four times more likely about 3. 7 to be exact, to be arrested for these crimes. And this hasnt just been dis o disproportionate arrests, we increased by 800 since 1980. 800 increase in the prison population. You have literally generations of people being ground into the criminal Justice System, overwhelmingly for nonviolent drug offenses and there are more africanamericans because of the disproportionate incarceration, there are more africanamericans under criminal than the slaves. It affects us all. Number one, hundreds of billions of dollars. You and i live in the new jerseynew york area. Bridges crumbling, tunnels crumbling. But we managed from the time i was in law school and mayor of new jersey to build a new prison every ten days. Investing in that infrastructure to the disregard of others. Understand, a study came out showing if america had incarceration rates at the same of our industrial peers, were way out of whack with our industrial peers. One out of every three incarcerated women on the planet earth. If we had incarceration as our industrial peers with, he would have overall in this country 20 less poverty. Why . Because when we have somebody who is 17 or older arrested and a felony charge for doing things that two of the last three president s admitted publicly to do, when we arrest that kid and he has to cop to a felony drug possession or possession with attempt to sell and for the rest of their lives they cant get a pell grant. They cant get business licenses. They are locked in an economic prison where they have very few ongss availab on options available to them. Finally, it affects our economic rights and our national wellbeing, it affects communities. But you also have to know that it also affects our politics. In florida right now, as an other states, they designed something called felony disenfranchisement fuchlt get that felony charge for doing things that Congress People do, if you get caught like people in the universities might not but youre in a community where this the drug crisis is targeted on you, you lose your voting rights. They literally had in discussions in state legislatures conversations about how do we disenfranchise africanamericans when they break the laudz thashgs done voting. In floefr right now the swing state of swing states, one in every five black people in that state cannot vote because of felony disenfranchisement. So you have taken tens and tens of thousands of people that can determine the outcome of elections and because they did things that Congress People have done, college kids have done without any remorse and without being captured, you now taken away their politi