Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news Now.
Speaker 2: Just moments ago, President Trump commented on the ongoing situation
Speaker 2: in Texas regarding the Democrats who fled the state to
Speaker 2: avert redistricting efforts. Take a listen.
Speaker 3: Well, I think they've abandoned the state. Nobody's seen anything
Speaker 3: like it, even though they've done it twice before, and
Speaker 3: in a certain way, it almost looks like they've abandoned
Speaker 3: the state. It looks very bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, go ahead, please get involved. Should the FBI get involved, well,
Speaker 2: they may have to. They may have to. Joining us
Speaker 2: now for more here on Balance of Power on Bloomberg
Speaker 2: TV and Radio is Democratic Texas State Representative James Tallerico.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Balance of Power. Representative. It's good to
Speaker 2: have you. The other thing we heard from the President
Speaker 2: is that Democrats did this redistricting first. That was his
Speaker 2: response when questioned about what's happening in Texas. Given the
Speaker 2: rhetoric we are hearing from other blue state governors, be
Speaker 2: it Kathy Hochel or Gavin Newsom, does the President have
Speaker 2: a point or Democrats kind of counteract your argument that
Speaker 2: what Texas is doing is wrong.
Speaker 1: No, not at all. Typically state legislatures, whether they're in
Speaker 1: blue states or red states, they adjust district boundaries at
Speaker 1: the beginning of the decade, and yes, they jerrymanders. Sometimes
Speaker 1: Democrats do it, sometimes Republicans do it. It is wrong
Speaker 1: in either instance because politicians shouldn't be picking their voters.
Speaker 1: Voters should be picking their politicians. But what's happening here
Speaker 1: is a whole nother level. The President of the United States,
Speaker 1: the most powerful man in the country, requested that Texas
Speaker 1: Republicans find him five more congressional seats, and so now
Speaker 1: they are redrawing the maps they just drew in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one to rig the next election for him, to
Speaker 1: insulate him from public accountability. And that's a fundamental disruption
Speaker 1: to the democratic process. If the president wanted to campaign
Speaker 1: on his policies and try to win base on the
Speaker 1: maps that we all set in twenty twenty one, that
Speaker 1: would be fine. That's how this process is supposed to work.
Speaker 1: But that's not what's happening. The President is trying to
Speaker 1: execute a power grab in the state of Texas, and
Speaker 1: we will not let him cheat in order to hold
Speaker 1: onto power.
Speaker 3: Reptel Rico, it's good to have you back. On Bloomberg.
Speaker 3: We spoke with your colleague and the Senate yesterday, Chris Turner.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry State Rep. Chris Turner, another Democrat who has
Speaker 3: fled I believe to the same city that you did.
Speaker 3: To try to make a point here, but we also
Speaker 3: kind of acknowledge the fact that this really will not
Speaker 3: change the outcome of this effort because the governor can
Speaker 3: continue to set special sessions, and mister Turner learned that
Speaker 3: just a few years ago in the last attempt at redistricting.
Speaker 3: I think it was five weeks before everybody came back
Speaker 3: and this took place at last. What is the real
Speaker 3: purpose of you leaving Texas? Is it to publicize what's happening,
Speaker 3: Is it to raise money around it? Or both?
Speaker 1: Well, I actually want to push back on the idea
Speaker 1: that our twenty twenty one quorum break was a failure.
Speaker 1: It wasn't. And I also want to clarify that it
Speaker 1: wasn't over redistricting. It was over a voter suppression bill
Speaker 1: that would have made it harder to vote in the
Speaker 1: state of Texas. Texas is one of the hardest places
Speaker 1: to vote in the entire country, and so we broke
Speaker 1: quorum and we drew national attention, a national spotlight on
Speaker 1: that voter suppression effort, and that spotlight convinced Texas Republicans
Speaker 1: to take the worst parts out of that bill. A
Speaker 1: ban on souls to the polls, which is Sunday morning voting,
Speaker 1: which African American churches traditionally use to get their congregants
Speaker 1: out to vote. Also a provision that would have allowed
Speaker 1: Republican politicians to overturn election results they didn't like. And
Speaker 1: both of those parts were taken out because of our
Speaker 1: quorum break. So it is a tool in the toolbox
Speaker 1: of the minority for when the majority oversteps their constitutional duties.
Speaker 1: And so I'm hoping that this quorum break can do
Speaker 1: the same thing by shining a national and now international
Speaker 1: spotlight on this power grab in Texas. We're hoping our
Speaker 1: Republican colleagues will walk back from the brink. I hope
Speaker 1: we can play by the same rules that we set
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one and not cheat in the middle
Speaker 1: of the game. I mean by mid decade redistricting, they
Speaker 1: are essentially like the team coming out of halftime during
Speaker 1: a football game that's ahead and they say they want
Speaker 1: to change the rules for the second half so they
Speaker 1: can win the game. That's cheating, plain and simple. If
Speaker 1: they're going to cheat, we're not going to play.
Speaker 2: Representative. We just heard from President Trump in response to
Speaker 2: the call from Republican Senator John cornyin of Texas to
Speaker 2: potentially get the FBI involved in the cases of lawmakers
Speaker 2: like yourself, who will flood the state of Texas to
Speaker 2: execute this quorum break. What is your reaction to that, sir.
Speaker 2: What happens if the FBI gets involved.
Speaker 1: Well, it's completely consistent with this rigged map. They are
Speaker 1: trying to rob Texans, Democrats, independents, and Republicans from their
Speaker 1: god given right to pick the representatives of their choice.
Speaker 1: And now Donald Trump and Greg Abbott and Ken Paxson
Speaker 1: are talking about removing or arresting public officials, the people's representatives,
Speaker 1: from their offices. And so this is a page out
Speaker 1: of the authoritarian playbook that we've seen in other countries.
Speaker 1: And it should be alarming to all of us, not
Speaker 1: just Democrats, but Republicans and independence too, not just elected
Speaker 1: officials but journalists too. This is a five alarm fire
Speaker 1: in a democratic system, and we all need to act
Speaker 1: with the urgency that this moment demands.
Speaker 3: Do you expect that someone will serve a warrant on
Speaker 3: behalf of the governor or the FBI try to extradite
Speaker 3: you representative. What scenarios have you mapped out based on
Speaker 3: what you've.
Speaker 1: Heard so far. Well, I think I can speak for
Speaker 1: myself and my colleagues when I say that we're not
Speaker 1: very worried about the consequences we may face, whether they
Speaker 1: are arrest or financial fines, or even removal from office,
Speaker 1: because we have right on our side. We are part
Speaker 1: of a long American tradition of looking bullies in the eye,
Speaker 1: of speaking truth to power, of civil disobedience, of good trouble.
Speaker 1: That is how this democracy was forged, and we are
Speaker 1: participating in that tradition, and we're proud to do it.
Speaker 1: When Donald Trump asked Georgia Republicans to find him eleven
Speaker 1: thousand votes after he lost the twenty twenty election, those
Speaker 1: Republicans said, no, sir. But when Donald Trump asked Texas
Speaker 1: Republicans to find him five more seats in Congress in
Speaker 1: the middle of the decade, they said, how about Thursday?
Speaker 1: And so that's why my Democratic colleagues and I had
Speaker 1: to take a stand again, not just for our party,
Speaker 1: but for all Americans.
Speaker 3: Democratic Texas State Rep. James tall Rico, we thank you
Speaker 3: for returning and joining our conversation here on Bloomberg