- Welcome back, we are going live from the
District with Congressman Ro Khanna.
Good morning.
- Good morning.
- [Interviewer] All right, here's a tweet
from you, Congressman.
Bernie Sanders has fought
for ordinary Americans
for decades, even when it's
made him unpopular with
wealthy donors and party elites.
He has the populist progressive vision
to lead us into the 21st century.
I'm proud to be national
campaign co-chair.
So not only are you endorsing
Bernie Sanders, but now
you're working for him.
Out of all the Democratic
candidates running,
why choose Bernie and why so early?
- Well, I think he
understands more than anyone
the income divide in this country,
and he speaks for working families,
for folks who are struggling
to be in the middle
class, for rural America
that's been left out.
He also has rejected all corporate money,
PAC money.
And finally, I worked with him
on the Yemen resolution,
and he's reorienting
foreign policy so that
we're not supporting
the Saudis, so that we're prioritizing
human rights.
So I just believe he has
a comprehensive vision
for economic justice and social justice.
- [Interviewer] All right,
I feel like a lot of that
could have been said the last presidential
election, though.
What is Sanders doing
differently this time?
- Well, a couple things.
Look, Hillary Clinton was a
very formidable candidate.
I mean, I supported Bernie in the primary,
but then Hillary in the general.
She was a Secretary of
State, she was a Senator.
So it's not to be underestimated that
he &got 13 million votes
against someone who
had universal name ID.
Now he starts out with a huge advantage.
He's the only person so far in the field
who's actually run for president.
He has 13 million votes.
I do think he has assembled
a very diverse team.
More people in his inner circle who come
from all different
backgrounds, and both in terms
of minorities and women,
and a more inclusive team,
and I think that's gonna serve him well.
- [Interviewer] Are you
satisfied with how Bernie Sanders
has responded to reported allegations
of sexual harassment and gender pay gaps
during his 2016 campaign?
- Well I had a conversation with him,
and he said there is gonna be a absolutely
zero tolerance policy
for this, if there is any
incident, the person will be removed, and
he has worked with leading
experts to make sure
that that's gonna have zero
place in this campaign.
And many of us co-chairs,
Nina Turner, myself,
and others, have made
that abundantly clear
that we cannot have any place
for that in this campaign.
- [Interviewer] You are
also now a member of the
House Oversight Committee,
which of course will
be publicly questioning
Michael Cohen on Wednesday.
Well do you personally
planned on asking him,
if he dodges a lot of
questions, would you be willing
to subpoena him?
- Well I do think we have to be willing
to subpoena him.
You know, I want to
know what he knew about
President Trump and are
there crimes that Trump
may have committed, or
illegal acts he did,
that he hasn't talked about yet.
Were there more women
who were paid hush money.
There are a lot of questions out there.
The New York prosecutors have said that
Michael Cohen hasn't
been fully forthcoming,
and we're gonna press him to make sure
that all of the information comes out.
What we want is transparency.
If he's unresponsive we should be willing
to subpoena him.
At the very least he should have to take
the Fifth Amendment if
he's not gonna respond.
- [Interviewer] All right, here's a tweet
from George Stephanopoulos.
Representative Adam Schiff tells me he is
absolutely prepared to sue
Trump Administration if
Mueller report is not made public.
So if it comes to a subpoena there,
would you support Adam
Schiff in that effort?
- I would, I mean look,
everyone should be for the transparency
of the Mueller report.
If Trump himself has said
that there's no collusion
and he's gonna be vindicated, he should
be for getting the Mueller report out
and letting the facts
speak for themselves.
You know, in Washington,
people who try to hide things,
conceal things, it never works out.
Everything eventually becomes public.
I am gonna push for the
transparency of that report
and I would support Adam
Schiff in any effort
to make sure that that report is public.
- [Interviewer] Okay.
California Senator Dianne Feinstein seemed
quite dismissive of the Green New Deal
in a video that took over
Twitter this weekend,
a lot of debate.
You of course were a early supporter
of the new deal, so I wanted to know,
what do you make of her
remarks to those kids?
Did she handle that moment well?
- Well it wasn't one of her highlights,
and, look I had endorsed her
opponent in the last primary
election, but after that
I sat down with her,
and she said that she
really wants to understand
some of the progressive
movement, she understands
that the party demands
action on Medicare for all,
and the Green New Deal.
That wasn't a highlight
for her but my hope is
that she will learn from
it, learn from the response,
and be supportive and understand why these
young people are so passionate.
I am very proud of being a supporter
of the Green New Deal.
It's gonna help create jobs
in communities left behind.
And it's necessary to avoid
catastrophic consequences
in 12 years according
to the Intergovernmental
Panel of Climate Change.
- [Interviewer] All right,
you have also spoken out
how apps like Instacart have
used tips in their services.
You said on February 8th,
they're basically having
wage theft.
So what are you doing to make sure workers
are getting paid?
- Well I spoke out about
it and in response,
Instacart a day later announced that they
were increasing their policies of wages
and not gonna take their tips.
Now it wasn't just because I spoke out,
there were a number of us that spoke out.
But look, I use Instacart,
my wife uses Instacart,
it's a convenient
service, it makes it easy
if you're traveling to get groceries,
but what we shouldn't be doing is using
innovation to deprive workers
of what they're entitled to.
It's ridiculous that
they have a default tip
of five percent.
I mean, who tips five percent?
Most people tip at least 15, 20 percent.
And it's ridiculous that
they were taking the tip
and removing that tip from people's wages.
I'm glad that they're now going to change
that practice.
They're a seven billion dollar company,
they're getting ready
to IPO, they can afford
to pay workers a fair wage.
- [Interviewer] You made
those comments about Instacart
when you were a guest on
Tucker Carlson's Fox News show.
You also said this recently about Carlson.
Tucker Carlson offers
a devastating critique
of interventionism and
shows how much of the
foreign policy establishment has failed
the American people.
There is an emerging left-right coalition
of common sense for a
foreign policy of restraint.
Congressman, why do you
think Tucker Carlson
is someone providing common
sense foreign policy?
- Well I don't agree with
Tucker on a number of issues,
certainly his comments on race and gender,
and I don't agree with him
on all of the foreign policy
issues, for example,
Venezuela, I have been
unapologetically saying we
shouldn't be intervening
or rushing to war, Tucker
has a different view.
But the article I cited
was one where he critiqued
Max Boot and Bill Kristol and said that
the war in Iraq was wrong.
Tucker has spoken out
about the war in Yemen
and our support of the
Saudis, and my view is,
that to stop endless wars, to stop our
casualties in Yemen, we
need to take a coalition
from as broad a perspective as we can.
I'm going and meeting Lindsey Graham,
because Lindsey Graham
is considering supporting
our War Powers resolution
to stop the war in Yemen.
So I vehemently disagree with Tucker
on many, many issues
but where he's willing
to speak out about the war in Iraq
or criticize people like
neocons such as Max Boot
or Bill Kristol, I think that his voice
on those discrete issues can help build
a coalition to stop bad wars.
- [Interviewer] Here's the
thing, and I know you're
kind of preempting this
a bit, but I'm gonna
push you on it, Congressman.
You know, only a few
months ago, advertisers--
- [Ro] No, please do.
- We're dropping Tucker Carlson's show
after he said immigrants
made the United States quote
"poor and dirtier".
So, you know, you're
saying that you, of course,
are willing to, you
know, find opportunities
to compromise with people
like Lindsey Graham
and Tucker Carlson, as long as, you know,
there are those opportunities,
but, at this point,
how do you justify continuing to show up
on Tucker Carlson's show?
Is there something that he would say or do
that would make you
decide, listen, I'm not
gonna appear anymore?
- Well look guys, you know,
I'm the son of immigrants,
my grandfather spent four
years in jail with Gandhi,
my parents came here, I
remember them having their
green cards stamped, and
I represent a district
that's 50% foreign born, and I understand,
representing Silicon
Valley, the contributions
that immigrant have made to this country.
There wouldn't be Apple,
there wouldn't be Google,
there wouldn't be
Microsoft, there wouldn't be
Facebook, if it weren't
for the contributions
of immigrants.
So I don't think anyone
has a record of speaking
about the positives of immigration more
than I do.
But here's the reality.
There are some of those who believe that
we shouldn't go on Fox News.
Fox News speaks to a large audience.
I believe that by going on
and sticking to my guns,
and sticking to my
principles, that is worth
engaging people, because
I fundamentally believe
that this is a good decent
country at its heart--
- [Interviewer] So, so Congressman -
- and going on I can make the case.
- [Interviewer] So Congressman--
- Now, if Tucker Carlson were--
- [Interviewer] So if
Tucker Carlson said, like,
white supremacists are great, would you
still be willing to show up?
- No, I mean obviously there is a line,
and at that point I
think people would call
for him to lose his show.
And there is a line that
we have to be mindful of.
But I do think that if Tucker Carlson
were to have me on and he were to say that
immigrants aren't making a contribution,
I would say, Tucker, that's crazy,
that's ridiculous, let me tell you.
In fact I went on his show and I talked
about a Pakistani immigrant in rural
West Virginia who is teaching kids code
and how much of a
contribution she's making.
Now here's the question.
I can go on MSNBC or your program all day
and talk about the
Pakistani American woman
and her contributions,
and people will say,
yeah, Ro, we agree.
But think about the power
of going on Fox News
and Tucker Carlson's
show, and getting to say
that to Fox News viewers.
We need to make the case for
a pluralistic, multicultural
America not just on forums that are easy,
but on places like Fox
News, so that we can
build a coalition for the
America we believe in.
We shouldn't be afraid
to engage in that debate.
- [Interviewer] All right.
- Donald Trump went on MSNBC a lot before
he became the nominee.
- [Interviewer] (laughing) Well
we're gonna have to leave it
there for now.
As always, thank you again
for coming back on AM to DM.
Congressman Rho Khanna.
- I love it, I love the
spirited conversation,
thanks for having me.
