'This Is Our Day Of Solidarity': Pramila Jayapal Speaks At May Day Rally In Support Of Labor

Forbes Breaking News

At a May Day Strong Coalition rally on Thursday, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) spoke about the importance of labor.

Transcript

00:01Thank you so much everybody! Happy May Day! This is our day of solidarity to say

00:11that immigrant rights are workers rights and workers rights are immigrant

00:17rights. And when immigrant rights are under attack, what do we do? When workers

00:26rights are under attack, what do we do? I want to thank CASA, all of the

00:32organizations, the unions that have been part of today, and I especially want to

00:36thank Jennifer Vasquez, I want to thank Carmen Luna for your strength, for your

00:43resilience, for everything that you are doing to show us what it looks like to

00:48stand up and fight back in the most terrible of circumstances. And I want you

00:53to know, I just spoke to Jennifer about this as well, next week as ranking member

00:57of the Immigration Subcommittee. We don't get to have official hearings, but we are

01:01having our own shadow hearing to make sure that we bring back Kilmar Abrego

01:09Garcia to the United States! And that will be next week, and I hope anyone that is

01:17here can come and show solidarity and insist that all of us stand up and do

01:22everything we can. We are here because we say not on our watch to Trump's

01:29kidnapping and deporting of immigrants, to going after immigrant workers who are

01:36union organizers like what happened in my home state of Washington, to deporting U.S.

01:42citizen children in the middle of cancer treatments, to rounding up legal permanent

01:52residents and people with legal visa status simply because you disagree with what they

01:58say in a country that is supposed to have free speech for everybody. We say not on our watch

02:08to killing industries that are powered by immigrants or terrorizing thousands of foreign students

02:14by revoking our visas. Not on our watch. We are here to say not on our watch to the wholesale

02:24war that Trump is waging on immigrants of every legal status and on workers and the right to

02:32collectively bargain. Brothers, sisters and siblings, these two things are tied together. They are tied

02:39together because when workers have power, that means we can take on those big corporations. And when

02:45immigrant workers are vulnerable, it means that they are trying to divide us so they can give

02:51themselves a four and a half trillion dollar tax break on our backs. We say not in our name.

02:57We've seen this before. They think that attacking immigrants as they tank the economy and destroy

03:06programs that meet our basic economic needs is going to distract us from that four and a half trillion

03:12dollar tax break that they want to give to billionaires like Elon Musk and his department of greed and ego.

03:19Are you distracted? Are we going to be divided? Look, this has been an age old story. The rich bosses

03:30want to get richer instead of paying workers a living wage when the rent is too damn high. Instead of

03:38paying their fair share of taxes so workers can have universal health care and child care and affordable

03:45housing. Well, on May Day, we are here to say you are going to distract us and you aren't going to divide

03:53us. Not on our watch. We know that it's not immigrants who are raising the cost of your rent. It's billionaires.

04:06It's not workers raising the cost of your groceries. It's billionaires. It's not immigrants

04:14raiding your social security. It's billionaires. It's not workers profiting from you being sick. It's

04:20billionaires. It's not workers or immigrants taking away your education. It is billionaires.

04:29In the workplace, whether you're an immigrant, whether you're native born, you're doing the work.

04:35You're doing the work, building homes, caring for our elders, teaching our kids,

04:39doing exactly what our communities need. And so we will fight like hell.

04:46For what we deserve. We will fight like hell to bring Kilmar Abrego Garcia home.

04:55We will fight like hell for workers like Miguel Luna, who urgently need safe workplaces and rights

05:02on the job. We will fight like hell for our union organizers, immigrant and native born who are

05:10being detained across the country, who's rights are being violated just because they're fighting for us to

05:18have collective power. We will fight like hell for all of us because immigrant rights are workers' rights.

05:29Workers' rights are an immigrant and workers' rights are human rights. Thank you all so much

05:37so much to solidarity, to justice. Let's fight forward and let's win.

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