Washington This Week previews Trump’s 2026 State of the Union (9 p.m. ET) and Democratic Senator Andy Kim’s critique of ICE’s "surge tactics," linking them to Trump’s policies like defunding the Gateway Tunnel ($200M restored by NJ’s Sherrow). Kim warns of an "extortion foreign policy" amid Iran tensions, with 2 carrier groups deployed, and allies distrusting U.S. stability post-Trump’s past statements (e.g., Greenland). Callers raise concerns: Jeff Laurenti questions Congress’s power to enforce New START nuclear limits after Trump’s expiration; Yolanda Curry urges repurposing vacant buildings for homeless veterans; Martha Hickson flags 23,000 banned books and First Amendment threats. Kim emphasizes equitable growth—like NJ’s photonics sector—and fixing legislative gaps, like Bidwais’ Social Security limbo tied to immigration status. [Automatically generated summary]
Sunday, moderate conservatives host the 2026 annual Principles First Summit with a discussion on military leadership and remarks from former Republican Representative Adam Kinzinger.
Watch our live coverage starting at 11.30 a.m. Eastern on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile app, and online at c-span.org.
Watch America's Book Club, C-SPAN's bold original series, Sunday, with our guest author, former Reagan administration official, and a Library of Congress living legend, Linda Chavez.
She has written a number of books, including Out of the Barrio, An Unlikely Conservative, and The Silver Candlesticks, a novel of the Spanish Inquisition.
She joins our host, renowned author and civic leader David Rubinstein.
How long did it take you to write the novel?
It took me almost 10 years.
10 years.
10 years, yes, to write the novel.
Leo Tolstoy wrote War and Peace in seven years.
So I know.
Well, what can I do?
It's 400 pages, David.
It's not a short book.
All right, well, man.
And actually, it was longer.
It was longer.
I had to cut my hands up.
You had to cut it.
Yes.
Watch America's Book Club with Linda Chavez Sunday at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific.
Only on C-SPAN.
Members of the United States Congress, thank you very much.
And to my fellow citizens, America is back.
Watch C-SPAN live Tuesday as President Donald Trump delivers the annual State of the Union Address before a joint session of Congress.
Our coverage begins at 7 p.m. Eastern with a preview of the evening from political reporters.
Then, at 9, the president's address, followed by the Democratic response given by Virginia Governor Abigail Spanbergson, will also take your calls and bring you reaction from lawmakers.
Over on C-SPAN 2, experience the moments leading up to the speech and the address itself as if you're there, uninterrupted.
No commentary with unfiltered sights and sounds.
The State of the Union Address live Tuesday with coverage beginning at 7 p.m. Eastern on the C-SPAN networks.
C-SPAN, bringing you Democracy Unfiltered.
Town Hall Traditions Matter00:02:11
To Asbury Park, New Jersey now, where Democratic Senator Andy Kim hosted a town hall meeting with constituents.
Topics included recent ICE actions and immigration enforcement, as well as other Trump administration priorities and how they affect New Jersey.
Good evening, everyone.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, Asbury Park.
Thank you, Deputy Mayor.
Thank you to all the local leaders.
Thank you to all of you for coming on out here.
This is such a pleasure to do.
It's so important to do.
I truly believe that the town hall is an incredibly important American tradition.
I think it's an incredibly important democratic tradition.
At a time when we see our country getting more and more divided, when we see online discussions and other things, you know, really getting in the way of us being able to just confront each other and talk to each other as people, to try to recognize the respect that is necessary within our democracy.
You know, at every single town hall, Kristen, you said this is the 92nd one.
that right?
At every single town hall, I say, whether you voted for me or not, you're my boss.
And my job is to serve you and your family to the best of my ability.
Are we going to agree on everything?
Absolutely not.
You know, we're going to have differences of opinions, but that's why it's important for me to hear from you because you are my boss.
You are my bosses.
And I need to hear from you.
I need to hear your perspectives, what is on your mind.
But it's also important for you to hear from me, hear what it is that I've been focusing on, my perspective on different issues, so that we can try to make decisions together as a community.
You know, my job is not that I'm not the CEO.
I'm not the president of this state.
I am a representative.
I'm a public servant.
And I really just want to continue to serve with that type of approach first and foremost.
So I just wanted to say thank you for joining me here today.
Why We Celebrate Black History Month00:15:25
There are a lot of different issues that we are struggling through as a country right now.
And I'll talk through some of them.
We also have an incredible speaker, Kay Harris, who will join us in a couple of minutes to talk about the importance of observing and celebrating Black History Month.
But look, I just wanted to start with some of the issues that I know are very much on our minds.
Look, a couple weeks have passed since we saw the horrific shootings of Alex Pretty, of Renee Goode, but I know it still feels very recent, right?
It still feels very fresh to a lot of us because what we are seeing is a level of violence, a level of just challenge that we're facing as a country that's really just shaking us to our core in so many different ways.
I don't know if you saw and read the statements from their families, but just for this to happen, not only for that to happen, but to have people like Christy Noam and Stephen Miller call them domestic terrorists trying to inflame the situation, pour gasoline on the fire.
I mean, it's so wrong.
It's so dangerous.
And it just gets to so much of the challenges that we're facing right now.
I was participating in a hearing in the Senate with the director of ICE, the director of the CBP.
And when I was going through this, it was just the other week.
It just, again, highlighted so much of the challenge that we're facing and just the extremism in their tactics.
For instance, I was pointing out that when you think through and you add together the police forces of Minneapolis, of St. Paul, of the state troopers of Minnesota, those three big pillars of the state, it's about 1,700 police officers that they have.
The sheer number of federal agents deployed through ICE and CBP were between 3,000 and 4,000 federal agents.
So just like giving You that perspective, like nearly twice the number of federal agents compared to the local law enforcement.
And that's why, you know, on the ground, it was very much.
I mean, the word that I hear from people in Minnesota is it felt like they were an occupied state, that they were an occupied city in Minneapolis.
And I just, I wanted to hit that home to you because, you know, look, we're facing challenges right here in our own state within our own communities, right?
I mean, you know, we see the problems, whether it's Delaney Hall up in Newark, which I've been to a couple times, and just seeing just the inhumane treatment at these detention facilities, especially the fact that they're run by these for-profit companies that are just making billions of dollars off of that, you know, industrialization of human misery.
Or, you know, the fact that right now ICE is trying to purchase a warehouse out in Roxbury, out west of Morristown.
And the community there doesn't want it.
Nobody in the state wants it.
Because we know that this is just going to further enable the type of actions that ICE has been taking all across this country and furthering that problem.
But it just, what you see in Minnesota is really the culmination of that.
What I asked the ICE director, because on that day that we did the hearing, they announced that they're going to remove the surge from Minnesota, something that they should never have done in the first place, but certainly should have de-escalated immediately upon just the rise of the challenges that they face there.
So I asked the ICE director, I said, now that you've seen so much of the damage that you have done to this state, to this country, can you look me in the eye?
Can you tell Congress that you will never use this surge tactic again?
Because when I see you leaving Minnesota, the first thing that comes to mind is where next?
Is it going to be New Jersey?
Is it going to be some other state?
So I said, can you look me in the eye and tell me that this is not a tactic that you're going to use again?
And of course, you know what he said.
He said, no, he can't do that.
Because this is still in their blood.
This is deep to the core.
This isn't just about one or two leaders.
This is a rot within the institution.
Not just of ICE, but we see it with CBP, which was the entity that was responsible for the killing of Alex Pretty.
We see it across the Department of Homeland Security, whether that's Christine Ohm, who I think many of you will agree should not be in that job, should be fired, should have to be resigned, or should have to be forced out of that job.
But it goes beyond that too, right?
Because I'll be honest with you, as I've seen up close how this administration works, even if she's removed, even if the head of ICE is removed, this administration will just put right back in somebody else that will just continue to do their bidding.
We know that so much of this goes right back up to people like Stephen Miller, who I think is right now the most dangerous person in this country, and goes right up to Donald Trump, who he himself said that they weren't going to change tactics, that they're not going to back down even after the killing of Alex Peretti and so much of what we saw.
So it just, it's important to keep that in mind.
You know, important that we are focused in on the different challenges that we're facing.
And look, like I said, you know, right here in New Jersey, we got to do our part.
Look out for different communities.
I mean, right here in this area, right, there was an incident at the Wawa up on Bridge Ave, up in Red Bank, you know, where ICE was there and just profiling people in the parking lot, grabbed somebody that's still in detention now.
You know, we see it up in Jersey City where there are ICE agents there saying like that they don't need a warrant, as if the Constitution was just optional for them.
It's advisory to them, apparently.
You know, these are the types of challenges that we're continuing to see.
So, look, I'm going to go out to Roxbury, talk to the community there, you know, do everything we can to continue to stop it.
I know the news made it sound like it was a done deal.
As far as I know, it's not.
And we're going to continue to push to stop that.
Other issues that I'm going to continue to go out to these different detention facilities, shine a light on this revolving door.
And again, it's not just that it's for-profit.
It's like that the company that runs Delaney Hall, for instance, GeoGroup.
You want to know who used to work at GeoGroup?
Tom Holman.
You think that's a coincidence, right?
You think it's a coincidence that GeoGroup gives millions of dollars to Donald Trump's inauguration and to other things like that and then gets these big contracts right back to them?
You know, like that's part of the problem here, is that it has become just this whole ecosystem of corruption that I think is just so deep to the bone of so many of the problems and it manifests in just such inhumane ways.
There was this one instance that again I raised in that hearing with the ICE director, where there was a father that was taken by ICE in custody and left their six-year-old daughter wandering the streets asking people if they have seen if she, if they have seen her dad.
I mean, just like, how heartbreaking is that?
You know, I got an eight-year-old, a 10-year-old, but even if I didn't have kids, I know that that's wrong.
It's just fundamentally morally wrong and so, like that's what I hate so much is that we have become, you know, we are losing touch with that sense of humanity.
Like you know, we're becoming a nation addicted to anger.
We're having this crisis of empathy as a country, you know, failing to be able to see just what things are like through other people's eyes, and I just urge you to continue to go out and engage with the community to be able to see this in terms of the challenges that we're facing.
That I hear from leaders across New Jersey.
Some of them are telling me that they and people in their communities are now carrying their passports around because they're worried about whether or not, you know, they're gonna get stopped on the streets or something like that.
You know, we've been pushing to make sure that you know religious institutions and healthcare facilities and schools.
You know that shouldn't be a place where ICE should be able to show up and grab people.
You know we we have to be thinking about just the core of our communities, and that's something that I promise you I will continue to fight for.
I think that this is so important for us, now more than ever, to be able to think through how we move forward on this.
And so much of this is actually taken away from the core issues that I hear from so many people about, which is still about affordability, still about the challenges that we face when it comes to housing, when it comes to health care costs, when it comes to and I know Asbury.
I know, you know there's, a lot of issues here about housing costs, a lot of issues about rental costs, a lot of issues about development and making sure we're developing the right way.
The pastor and I and some others had a conversation about challenges of unemployment, especially in the black community, and making sure that we are lifting up opportunities for everybody.
You know that it isn't about who you know or how much money you donate to so-and-so.
It's about fairness, on just fundamental fairness when it comes down to it in terms of these opportunities, but does it look like we have fairness now?
Like you know, when Donald Trump, I was there in the Rotunda when he was inaugurated and in his speech he talked about this is going to be a golden age, golden age for America.
Well look, 14 months in, or 13, I don't know it feels like eight years in like.
Does it feel like a golden age for America?
You know what it is?
It's a golden age for those billionaires that are up on stage with him at the inauguration.
You know, it's a golden age for Mark Zuckerberg, for Jeff Bezos.
It's a golden age for Elon Musk and for TikTok and all these others that were willing to kiss the ring.
And that's what I just find so, so deeply broken, you know, about this.
Because as I was just telling you about these ICE raids and CBP and the surf, you want to know where that came from?
It came from you in terms of your money.
that it was that reconciliation bill that literally did a wealth transfer from those that are on Medicaid who are the most vulnerable in our communities, took that money and gave it to Homeland Security, gave it to Stephen Miller, gave it to those that are.
So I just wanted to connect the dots there.
Because this is not only a president that isn't focused on affordability, he could care less about your affordability.
He is a president that is literally making things harder for us on so many of the issues that are fundamentally important to us.
And I just think that that is important because that kind of corruption, whether that's literally the billions of dollars, I often say, you know, Trump's family has made billions of dollars since January 20th last year.
How much has your family made in the last 13 months?
You know, whether it's that kind of direct wealth transfer or it's about just the implicit corruption of these contracts, the GeoGroup and Core Civic and others, that's something that I hope we are all able to focus in on.
And we'll get back to some of that later.
And I've got a couple other issues I wanted to engage.
But as we're going through this, I did want to just bring up Kay Harris.
Where's Kay?
So, Kay, if you don't mind, why don't you welcome up Kay Harris here to be able to take a step back here and give us a reminder because when we want to think about where we're going as a country,
especially as we're observing and celebrating our 250th anniversary as a nation, I think it's important for us to be able to acknowledge all of our history, to acknowledge not just, you know, we don't want a situation where we're literally continuing to see this government pulling down panels in Philadelphia that are talking about slavery, right?
You probably saw that in the news.
You know, thankfully, they just put the panels back up because of a judge.
But one thing I just want to say before I hand it over to Kay, the government attorney that was arguing to justify them pulling those panels down, this is what he said.
The government gets to choose the message it wants to convey.
That is wrong.
Just flat, disgustingly wrong.
And I just wanted to share that with you because that's what they say out loud.
You can imagine what they think inside their thoughts there.
But it shows you what we're up against.
You know, just the selective history that is out there.
Whereas for us, we need to understand the totality of it all.
The good and the bad.
The things that we have to learn from.
And that's why it's so important.
That's why I asked Kay to be able to come up here and share a little bit of the history here in this area.
Thanks, Kay.
so much.
Good evening, everyone.
And thank you, Senator Kim, so much for this opportunity to come.
And afterwards, you'll have the opportunity to hear, actually hear from our public community.
So thank you for that, and also for Pastor Newton for opening up your home to us.
And I'd like to say, it's just so fitting that we are actually holding this town hall meeting or discussion here at St. Stephen's Church.
because this is actually ground zero for the civil rights movement.
I was asked to talk a little bit about civil rights, but I can't start it in the 1950s, 60s because they actually started decades earlier.
And if you can remember back to when Asbury Park was actually founded in 1971, do you realize that was just six years after the end of the Civil War?
So that was in the midst of Reconstruction.
And of course, Reconstruction was the opportunity to establish rights for African Americans and getting them involved, get their feet up on the ground, move forward to abolish slavery with the 13th Amendment and also the 14th Amendment.
But then what happens after Reconstruction?
There's the backlash of Jim Crow laws.
Reconstruction's Promise and Backlash00:14:26
And in my mind, I think that there could be a lot of parallels that we can learn from the past and the present.
Because what happened in 2008?
Our first president, Barack Obama, Obama was our first African-American president.
We're so proud of it.
But then there's another backlash.
But to get into the historical aspect of Asbury Park, I really like to set the stage to those founding years following the Reconstruction or during that period of time.
Keep in mind that when it was founded, 10 years after it was founded, we had over 800 hotels, cottages, and boarding houses in Asbury Park.
Asbury Park attracted thousands of white visitors to come and visit in the Asbury Park area.
But we also saw an influx of blacks from the South seeking better employment and some trying to escape the KKK backlash as well.
So with the development of all of these commercial businesses and hotels, what does that mean?
We need waiters, porters, dishwashers, cooks.
And these were elaborate ballrooms.
They had bowling alleys.
So they also required musicians.
And when they came, where did they reside?
They tended to reside on the west side of Asbury Park.
And I might remind you, when James Bradley founded Asbury Park in 1871, that was really just the territory from Ocean Avenue to about Memorial Drive where the railroad tracks are.
So everything on the west was still a part of Neptune Township.
And it wasn't just African Americans that lived there.
It also brought an influx of Italians, Jews.
A lot of the Italians are the ones they came and helped build the railroad and dig the ditches.
We had our Latinos and Germans.
So it was a very diverse neighborhood on the west side.
But as things moved on, there tended to be a backlash once again because you had all of these workers here and they wanted to enjoy the boardwalk and beaches as well.
So very quickly, James Bradley started to introduce restrictions to access to these facilities.
And in terms of the beach itself, They were, he came up with a good idea.
There was a section on the boardwalk, and everybody keeps thinking about the part south of this casino.
But actually prior to that, they really were in the main area.
But he said, oh, I have a good idea.
We'll restrict it to 5 to 7 a.m.
That could be the time that the blacks, and that'll keep everybody happy.
But of course, it did not.
So during that time, we had a series of what they call indignation meetings.
And these were led by people such as Reverend Robinson that I mentioned.
And also there was Reverend Dickerson as well.
And Reverend Dickerson is also from one of our churches.
In fact, the churches were, just as Pastor Newton had mentioned, was really the forefront of civil rights activities.
So there was a lot of activity there.
And then eventually, because of the backlash, they did try to incrementally, okay, I know what we'll do.
We'll put a placard where everybody, it was just the workers of the hotels because they were complaining that they were taking away all of the prom spaces from the regular visitors.
And what I'd like to do is kind of give you, so you can hear some of the voices from these prominent outspoken people at that time, such as Reverend Robinson.
And they did hold indignation meeting at places such as Stephen AME Church.
And he says, we own land, we raise the wheat, the corn, and we help save the union.
We love our race and propose to vindicate our race when it is imposed upon us.
But where the parlor is filled with guests, when did they refuse entrance to a colored man when they wanted a glass of water or cocktail?
In the barbershops, the white people are willing to have our black hands upon their faces, and yet they object to our presence on the beach.
And in terms of Reverend Dickerson, the right thing to do is basically just to beat out, to weed out all bad character, because oftentimes they'll criticize blacks and, oh, they're loud, they're doing this or that.
And he says that sometimes they're white folks that I wouldn't want to hang around myself.
So why are you just relegating it just to the African Americans?
And one's financial ability to board at a hotel and dress well is not a criteria of one's moral worth.
And when they had these indignation meetings, it wasn't just here local.
They reached as far as St. Mark's Church in New York City.
In fact, they even had busloads of folks to come to Asbury Park, and they and Reverend Robinson led what they call wait-ins, which was a precursor to the sit-ins that we experienced in the 1960s.
And I just wanted to mention other names such as Reverend A. E. Jensen, and he happened to be the pastor, the minister or reverend of St. Augustine's Church, which is my church right down the street.
And then in terms of the progress that is made, they finally said, okay, we will relinquish, but instead they gave them a part of the beach between 1st and 2nd Avenue.
And that was the mainstay of things.
And by the way, I think it's interesting that the coverage that we had was beyond Philadelphia, New York, and area.
I actually looked up newspapers in Indiana that was talking about, oh, all the black, the colored folks taking over Asbury Park.
There was also an article in the Fort Worth Daily Gazette, which I'd like to read to you.
And they kind of referred to the hypocrisy of the North.
Even if Northern hotels and sleepers did refuse to take the medicine they insisted upon prescribing for their southern counterparts in the purifying waters of Long Branch, Asbury Park, etc.
This compromise does not emit the races into the water during the same hours and marks the towels.
Lest, by chance, the white hand and leg should be dried on the linen of a hand performed the same service by black hand, the leg a week before by a humbug and in later years.
Eventually, James Bradley did relinquish to some extent and he said, okay, they can have all of First Avenue Beach and that was the playground of the Asbury Park area and, matter of fact, in some of the papers, even written by T. Thomas Fortune, actually this was an upstanding place where folks from all over, like this, was the playground for even African Americans.
However, they started putting up signages, okay, you're on the beach.
Signs went up.
All blacks, not just the waiters and the workers, no blacks were allowed in the pavilions and restaurants.
And this was due to the pressure from the different hotel owners that resented that.
And then Asbury Park was annexed to not Asbury, the west side was annexed as a part of Asbury Park in 1903.
So we also had the power of our vote.
And because there was a period of time in 1912, there was a natatorium was being built on the boardwalk right at 2nd Avenue.
So even though for years they were satisfied with letting the blacks have this area anytime they want, once the natatorium went up, oh boy, they're in the sight of too many white folks.
So once again, we have to move them.
In fact, in the dead of night, they took all of the little houses they used for dressing rooms.
They moved them out to 8th Avenue where the fishing pool, fishing area is.
And of course, again, there was another backlash.
So you do have people such as Atkins and also Dr. Parks was another prominent person that was active in that area.
And okay, they had to let them have their place.
So they were able to maintain their little playground for another five or six years.
And then eventually in 1915 or about 1911, excuse me, they actually did, they were successful in moving them north of, I mean south of the convention hall of the casino area.
That's the area between Ocean Grove and Asbury Park.
In fact, today there are signs that say no swimming allowed.
It's kind of dangerous to do so.
So it seems as though the fight continued even onward after that.
Then I'd like to take you into like the next century because the voices actually changed over time.
Once you get into the 1920s, there was like the KKK, for example.
An interesting thing about the KKK, we know it was in the South, and there were some eventually some protests, but I noticed that it was a journal 1923 in the Savoy magazine that had plenty of articles or advertisements posted in their programs.
So the KKK did creep up in this area and was like a mainstream organization.
And then there are other work on voices such as Walter Upperman, who was a prominent attorney, F. Leon Harris.
I might mention my grandfather, who was a community activist, and he was also, he and my grandmother were the founders of the Asbury Park Neptune NAACP.
And Dr. Parks was actually the president of the NAACP at that time.
So as I mentioned, the NAACP, I would say as we go into this next century, there were other voices, such as Ermin Jones in the 1970s, Howard West in the 1980s onward, along with Maxine and Thomas Daniels, who are prominent.
He's actually an engineer of this area, and he was also a human rights activist.
And then eventually Adrian Sanders.
I'm just trying to go through a timeline just to give you a sense how the fight continues.
Sometimes it's in a more subtle manner.
It's the bias and segregation that creeps into the schools and into the workplace.
So if you go back to the 1940s, as I mentioned, the West Side was a very diverse neighborhood.
Bains Avenue was actually two different buildings, Bains Avenue North and South.
The whites were in the north, and then this African Americans were in the south side.
And then in 1946, there was a fight, and we also had Hyla Moore, who is an African-American principal.
They fought, as I'm running out of time.
I've got to make sure we get back to the questions and whatnot.
Okay, okay.
Can I just mention one other thing?
I won't mention, there's plenty of other people I don't want to overlook, but I just wanted to acknowledge Valerie Roberts here today, who earlier this evening received a proclamation from the senator, and I wanted to thank you very much for that.
And the fact that her father owned a business, opened up a business on Springwood Avenue in 1940, but it continued years after that, 60 years, even after the uprising or ride of Springwood Avenue.
So she was very wealthy, and she survived another 56 years.
And after having recently put up the exhibit, The Commercial Rides of Asbury Park, I have learned that she's not just the longest African-American business operating on Springwood Avenue.
Dow's business is one of just a few businesses in continuous operation, not just in Springwood Avenue, but the entire city of Asbury Park.
Challenges Ahead00:09:40
Thank you.
Thank you, Kay.
Thanks for giving us that rundown and really appreciate the chance to be able to just take a step back because I know it gets so easy for us to just get caught up in the day-to-days.
But now, more than ever, it's important for us to have that broader context.
I just want to run through just a few more issues and then we'll open it up because I want to make sure we have enough time for a good number of questions.
I get asked a lot about this next issue, which is about the gateway tunnel.
This is something that's unfortunately made national news because Donald Trump said he's going to terminate the project and cut off all the funding to it.
That's illegal.
That's against all the contracts, against what we have done in Congress.
And that's something that we need to make sure we're standing up for, not just because it's important to New Jersey, which it is.
I mean, this is important for our commuters.
This is important for our economy.
This is important for, you know, I have this bipartisan group of mayors that I've been talking to out in the Raritan Valley that are talking about the importance for their communities.
It's important for here.
But it's also important for our country.
You know, this is a project that's going to bring in hundreds of billions of dollars in economic growth.
It is arguably the most important current construction project we have in the nation right now.
So it's not just about our state or our region.
It's of national importance.
Which makes it all the more just infuriating when Trump, just because of political retribution, which is why this has happened, says he's just cutting off the money.
Because this is like one of the, like, you know, there are a lot of crazy things happening, so it's hard to make generalizations, but this is one of the clear, just shoot ourselves in the foot type of situations that I've seen.
There really is nothing good that comes out of it.
We have a thousand construction jobs that were put on hold.
You know, construction workers that I talked to, they talked about how they thought they were going to have a decade of steady work.
Now they're not certain.
A lot of them, some of them moved up to the area to be able to do this type of work.
And the idea that the president might change his mind if we put his name on Penn Station, I mean, like, geez, like, have we gotten to that point where like extortion is just so out in the open and rampant?
Unfortunately, yes.
And I'm glad that a judge has so far pushed back on this.
And I'm glad that we have a governor that stood up as well.
So thank you, Mikey Sherrow.
Thank you to the Gateway Gateway.
Thank you to the Port Authority.
Thank you to others that are standing up and fighting this because we were able to get over $200 million restored.
But do I feel certain that this is going to continue?
Unfortunately, the answer is no.
So we got to keep at it through these legal challenges that are out there, but just continuing to raise the issue.
And I had on a telephone town hall a Republican mayor that said this is not a partisan issue.
And we have to continue to press that.
This is not something that we need to see.
But unfortunately, we're seeing that not just domestically, but internationally as well.
We have an extortion foreign policy happening in this country.
I was just in Munich the last weekend at the Munich Security Conference where we saw just left and right, unfortunately, allies from around Europe and around the world just telling me in meeting after meeting that they're just moving forward.
They cannot wait for our country to get our act together.
And, you know, what happened a couple weeks ago when Trump was literally threatening military action to take Greenland, that was just the breaking point.
And what was really sad, and I say this as someone who worked in diplomacy, I worked in foreign policy before, is that it just became very clear to me in Munich something that I already felt that I know you feel too, which is some of this damage that's being done right now is irreversible.
It is irreversible, the damage.
It's not going to be like, you know, once Trump is out of office and we have another president, we're not going to have a we're back moment anymore.
The rest of the world just doesn't trust not just Donald Trump.
They don't trust our system of government right now.
They don't trust the special interests and the billions of dollars of super PAC money that is, you know, taking our democracy hostage.
I mean, I think when the history books are written, that Citizens United decision will be seen as one of the most damaging and destructive things in the history of our country.
And it was just, it was tough.
You know, it was tough.
I say that as someone who lived and worked on a NATO military base in Afghanistan, you know, 16, 15, 16 years ago.
You know, I saw our NATO allies come to our defense after September 11th.
And now I see them literally ask me.
One of them asked me, if something were to happen to our country, if an attack happened to our country right now, can you say for certain that your country, that America would respond?
That's what's at stake here.
They are, whereas we, you know, the way I always kind of say it is like, we are no longer seen as the indispensable nation.
We are seen as the unreliable nation.
And it's only, honestly, even goes beyond that now.
Some of the countries that I talk to, their leaders say that when they're talking in their own national security way, that they now talk about our nation as a threat.
They talk about our nation as a national security threat that they now need to hedge against.
And so I just wanted to share that with you because I was just there a couple days ago and it's still very fresh from across the board.
And we see that right now, things aren't slowing down on the international level.
If you're seeing some of the news today, I mean, Donald Trump has positioned military assets all throughout the Middle East.
We have now two aircraft carrier groups out there, 10 naval destroyer ships out there as he is now threatening potentially in the next few days taking sustained and significant military action against Iran.
Now, look, I don't think anybody here is going to defend Iran.
We know the dangers that they pose, but we also know the dangers that this poses.
As someone who worked in Iraq, worked in Afghanistan, I worry so much, I mean, what our country has been through, especially when we have so many other challenges.
So I say that, like, look to this crowd right now, how many of you raise your hand if you want to see our country go to war with Iran next week?
Raise your hand if you think that if a president is going to take military action, that they need to hear from the voice of the American people and be able to bring this before Congress, right?
This is just what I find so crazy about this situation is where we saw that military action in Venezuela, the boat strikes, the raid that got Maduro.
We have not had a single public hearing in Congress in the House or the Senate dedicated to Venezuela, dedicated to the challenges that we're facing and this type of challenge that we're going through right now.
And I just wanted to share that with you because it is so unnerving to see our government taking these steps that are putting our service members in harm's way.
Do we have the best military in the world?
Of course, and we are incredibly proud of how trained they are, but they are there for our defense.
They are not there to be a personal militia to this president that he can just use whenever he wants.
It pains me whenever I take the train down to Union Station in D.C. and just see all the National Guard there.
The idea that this president is trying to normalize us having military troops in our cities, in our streets, that is not right.
You know, and that's the kind of challenge that we see when he's using federal agents in Minnesota, when he's using the National Guard around our country, and he's deciding that he singularly can make these decisions that put our service members in harm's way and potentially increases the chance that the United States gets bogged down in a military conflict at a time when,
again, the number one thing that we're concerned about is about affordability and the challenges that we're going through right now.
And not only is he doing this militarily, but we're seeing that America first in foreign policy terms means America alone.
And I saw that in Munich, and I see that with every other conversation that I'm having.
And that scares me because, as I said, I got two little boys, and I don't want them to grow up in a world that is this chaotic and dangerous, but with America so isolated.
Mental Health Advocacy00:15:00
You know, you got to be a friend before you need a friend.
And we're going to have a lot of challenges going forward.
These are dangerous times.
But I can tell you, we'd be better at getting through that when we're doing it alongside our allies and our partners and when we're doing it with the American people involved and united behind these decisions.
The last thing I'll just say, and we'll open it on up, just more on the personal side, but it's an issue I think probably resonates with a lot of you.
Some of you might have saw, I announced, I gave a speech about a month or so ago talking about how my father's been recently diagnosed with Alzheimer's.
This has been a really challenging time for my family.
We've seen this decline for some time, and it's all made all the more tragic by the fact that my dad was actually a scientist that dedicated his life to try to cure Alzheimer's.
And now when we're at the doctor's office doing the memory tests and other diagnosis, the doctor was asking tests about where was he born and this and that and asked the question, what was your job?
What was your career?
And my dad said, I don't know.
And you can't help but feel that Alzheimer's wins when my father no longer remembers that he was dedicating his life to trying to cure Alzheimer's.
So I feel a real particular mission to really try to make sure we're pushing this forward, that we are engaging and continuing the medical research that this country so badly needs that we've been leading on globally.
And we can't let Donald Trump and RFK Jr. Decimate the National Institutes of Health and decimate our ability to be able to do this type of cutting-edge research, which has saved so many lives.
And one thing I will say: when people ask, what can you do in Congress?
How can you push back?
What I will say is that through the appropriations process, we were able to restore almost the entirety of the money that Trump was trying to cut from the NIH.
Those are the types of things.
I don't know, they don't make headlines.
They don't always get that front-page news, but there are ways that we've been able to push back, and those are things that we need to continue on.
So I wanted to share that with you.
But I also just wanted to say this experience with my family and with my father, it has really shown me the challenges that so many face when it comes to caregiving as well.
It's not just the fact that we have 200,000 people in New Jersey that have Alzheimer's.
We have an estimated 600,000 people in our state that have Alzheimer's or dementia.
But they're surrounding them are literally hundreds of thousands and millions of New Jersey Americans around this country that are caregiving, that are trying to make ends meet and seeing the incredible costs that it takes.
Now in our state, the average cost of a single room for a residential at-home, residential elder care is roughly around $15,000 to $17,000 a month.
Who can afford that?
I mean, it's crazy how broken things are gotten.
So I'm working on legislation that would try to open this up for Medicare to be able to earnestly do what it should have been doing all along and be able to help people through these situations, for us to be thinking about other types of reforms to be able to support, but also make sure that these caregivers know that they're not alone and be able to give them some support and help.
It's so important.
I'll just end on this story.
I had a neighbor a couple doors down from me a couple years ago, and I saw a for sale sign outside her door and I saw her on the street and I said, What's going on?
I saw you put your house up.
And she just started crying and telling me how her husband has dementia and they just can't afford the care and she needs to downsize.
But she was saying, like, this was their forever home.
You know, this was the home that they raised the family in and they were planning to grow old in.
And she just broke down just talking about how broken this is.
And she's saying, like, I hope you can try to fix this one day.
And I'll just tell you, I didn't understand fully what she was going through at that time.
But I do now.
And I just, you know, for as long as I am in the U.S. Senate, I just promise you I will stay on top of these issues about health care, stay on top of these issues about care in general and the challenges we are facing.
And I'm going to do everything I humanly can to try to fix this once and for all and give us the kind of justice that we deserve when it comes to our lives, when it comes to our health care, and for us to be able to be there for our loved ones.
And I hope that's something that people across the political spectrum want, because Alzheimer doesn't care if you're a Democrat or Republican, caregivers or Democrats, Republicans, it's all of us.
So, yes, we have issues that we're divided on.
But I've also seen and I've also seen the power of trying to mobilize and build a movement around these issues that hit us at our fundamental core as human beings.
And I think that that hopefully will show us the way of how we pull out of this tailspin we're in as a country and get us back on a path where we can hopefully say to our loved ones that we will work and have the kind of support that they need to be able to live a life of dignity and decency.
Thank you, everybody.
So why don't we take questions as long as we can.
We do them two at a time just to kind of make sure we go fast and get through them.
Sure.
Senator Kim, thank you for coming and doing this town hall, first of all.
I moved to Toms River recently, a lifelong New Jersey resident, and I was stunned and frankly infuriated to find that my Congressman Chris Smith, who's been there for 41 years, is too good to do these.
It's an absolute act of disrespect for constituents, and I don't know why we re-elect him.
So, thank you and keep it up.
The issue I would like to bring up with you, there's so many issues, but the one I would like to bring up with you is for anyone in this room on Social Security, I'm not yet.
I'd like to get some though someday since I've paid all my life for it.
You are, if you're alive in 2033, you're going to get a 20% cut in your Social Security.
Correct me if I'm wrong on any of this, unless Congress does something collectively and acts to secure funding for the Social Security Trust Fund, which is expected to go insolvent at that point.
At which time, payroll taxes are going to be the only source.
So, there's a lot of options out there.
I hope you're thinking about them.
Increasing the payroll tax, I think a donut hole strategy would be great.
The one thing that would really, really upset me, though, is if you did a means test and you said, Hey, guy, you've managed to save a few nickels because you didn't drive a new car, you didn't go on fancy vacations, et cetera.
You don't deserve any of that Social Security that you've paid into all your life.
So, I would hope to hear what you have to say about this issue, and someone has to do something about it.
So, thank you for your time today.
Yeah, thank you.
Hi, Senator Kim.
I'm Angela Tsai.
I'm actually a local elected official up in Morris County.
I'm also a director of the Boys and Girls Club in Patterson and Passaic.
And so, I wanted to first thank you and your team directly because just recently, as of last week, we found out that we got $500,000 worth of congressional-directed spending to use towards trauma-informed wraparound care for our 2,000 young people and their families.
So, this is on-site mental health services, wellness, social-emotional learning.
So, really, when you talk about how much you want to make sure care is brought to the communities that really need it, I really do believe you.
So, I want to give you a big thank you and a round of applause because he does do it.
He takes action.
And on that, my question is: what kind of federal actions further do you think are necessary in order to really sustain this type of mental health care that we see?
You know, the needs rising all across the country for our young people.
How can we keep that care sustained through those communities that really do need it most?
Two of the biggest issues that I hear about, I'll take them in order.
You're absolutely right.
You know, our Social Security is not on a sustainable path here.
And this is one of those issues that affects everybody, and it is very important that we take on.
The solution that I've been supportive of so far is this idea that we like right now, you know, the payroll tax capped at what, $184,500,000.
That's not fair when others are making so much more.
And so the idea that someone earning a million dollars, that they're basically capped out of the same as someone earning $180,000.
So there's a proposal out there that it'll go up to that cap, but then it'll pick up again above $400,000.
And that's something that if we're able to do and make sure that, again, just about fairness here in terms of percentages that are out there, that that is something that can put our Social Security on a much better path.
I think that this makes sense.
I think it's something that, especially after this big giveaway to the billionaires through the reconciliation bill last year, that makes sense in terms of how we can do this in a way that will be fair to the most number of people.
So that's been an approach.
If there are other ideas that people have that you want to get on my radar, let me know.
But when I've kind of gone through this in greater detail, that's something that I think doesn't disadvantage those that are just continuing to try to struggle through in the middle class life, making sure we're able to push forward on it.
On the issue about just broader, first of all, I'm glad that funding was able to come through when it comes to your organization, and it's just so important, especially for young people that are struggling.
I'll tell you that the top issue that I hear about from educators and parents right now is about concern of mental health for youth.
It's something that is really alarming, especially given just what we're seeing when it comes to social media and technology.
A lot of concerns.
I think our state's moving in the right direction when it comes to some of these restrictions on phones and schools and other things that hopefully can be able to create some more space.
But you're right, it has to be in a sustained way as well going on top of that.
This is one of those issues that infuriates me because when I talk to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, mental health, especially for kids, is literally the top issue that I would say we're hearing kind of bipartisan support for in words.
But we're just not seeing the space for this when it comes to legislation.
In fact, after the Uvalde shooting down in Texas, we were actually able to pass legislation that was considered to be the largest push for gun violence prevention in decades.
It was predominantly a mental health bill.
It was predominantly a bill about supporting mental health called the Safer Communities Act.
That is something that this current administration has gutted all the money to.
So all the money that we came up with this bipartisan approach to be able to do has been held back by this president.
And again, we just heard nothing, nothing from leaders on the Republican side about this.
And so, you know, I'm continuing to push on this.
I'm grateful again that we have a state that has been focused on a lot of these issues, but we need to make sure we're doing better and keeping focused on this and coming up with an actual national strategy to be able to tackle mental health.
And again, that's something that I think I can play a particular role on.
I think there are not that very many of us in this U.S. Senate that are parents of young kids, be able to talk about this firsthand, about the challenges and worries that we have for our kids and our grandkids is important.
But that's an issue that I hope you all continue to raise up as well.
It's not always, again, something that makes the front page news, but it's something that I really think everybody is understanding just how bad this is getting, and we have to stay on top of it.
So, thanks for raising it.
We'll do another round.
Senator Kim, I too want to thank you for coming to Asbury Park.
I care about one thing only: the midterm elections.
I would argue that our democracy hangs in the balance.
And my question is about awareness of the SAVE Act.
I talk to people from both sides of the aisle and they talk about, oh, it's, you know, there they are bringing up the whole thing, the myth of, you know, a voter fraud.
And, you know, I don't think it's a bad thing to show an ID, whatever.
And obviously, we know it goes so far beyond that.
Marginalizing millions of women in this country who have changed their names.
I vote by mail.
It nullifies that.
And I know this is just the first salvo this administration.
There's no way that they're going to really let these elections go on without cheating, without, but this SAVE Act really concerns me.
And my concern is about where to DNC, where we spend our money in getting the word out.
If I talk to people, don't even know what this act is, and they're saying, like, well, showing an ID is not a big deal, this is way, way beyond that.
And we should put all of our money, all of our energy, this should be everywhere.
And most importantly, the oligarchs you were talking about, who are sitting on that dais, who let's be honest, they control everything right now.
They have employees, young employees, female employees.
Election ID Controversy00:15:18
Those employees have children.
We need to be talking to them and getting it out.
That's where the pressure is to the Bezos and the Musk and everyone out that, like, this will not stand.
We cannot work for an organization like this.
This has got to be some kind of massive effort because November scares the hell out of me.
Thank you.
Hello, Senator Kim.
Senator Kim.
Hi.
Hi.
Actually, you stole my first question in a way.
I was going to ask you about NIH funding.
As a healthcare advocate myself, at this point, those NIH cuts, how is we, as New Jersey residents, how can we help you to fully restore those NIH cuts and to combat future threats to medical research and science in the country?
Let me take them in reverse on this one.
I think the NIH cuts are a reflection of just this broader turn away from science, right, that we're seeing left and right, a turn away from education that we're seeing left and right.
And that's something that really alarms me in terms of just the trajectory that we're on.
First of all, it is so damaging to our global competitiveness, to our economy.
When we're thinking about our ability to innovate, our ability to engage and be able to come up with the next cures, that's so important.
But I hear from some of my Republican colleagues, they're like, well, the private sector can handle that.
And it's so fundamentally wrong because if you talk to any pharmaceutical company or biotech company, they'll be the first to tell you that it's the basic science, the basic research that they're able to build off from.
That is something that the government is able to do better than anybody else in terms of being able to mobilize.
And that's our taxpayer dollars, right?
I don't see us getting a rebate for that basic science investment that we're making.
And that's something that we need to make sure that we're pushing forward on.
We should be proud of what our scientists have been able to do.
People like my father that have been pushing on this and trying to cure these diseases.
The reason why my father got into this is my father was born during the Korean War in Korea, during the war, and he was born with polio and suffered from that illness for the rest of his life, disabled him.
And he saw during his lifetime great scientists nearly eradicate from the world the plague that disabled him.
And he was thinking through, what's the next challenge?
You know, cancer and Alzheimer's became sort of his next big push.
And that's what we should be doing.
That's forward momentum, right?
Instead, now we're at a point where I'm literally in hearings and hearing witnesses telling me that the polio vaccine is a threat to our health.
And that we have, you know, RFK Jr. who literally said on a podcast that, you know, he thinks that the polio vaccine has killed more people than it has saved.
I mean, it's just absolutely atrocious, you know, what is happening.
But again, this is one of those issues that I think has strong support across the American people.
And we have to make sure that we are pushing back in this.
The American people across the political spectrum understand the importance of medical research.
And we cannot let the disinformation, and that's what it is, disinformation, not misinformation, disinformation, purposeful lies to the American people, you know, about this, preying upon our fears.
And I hate that too, because so often it's preying upon the anxiety of parents, right?
Like, you know, we get always spun up about challenges to our kids and issues that could affect them.
And they are, you know, people who are weaponizing this, you know, weaponizing this.
And I just find that to be so scary that the people now weaponizing it are now in positions of such power, you know, that they can try to stop this.
So that's something that I promise you I'll continue to push forward on.
It's so important.
Look, I'm right there with you on the midterms.
I am going to talk about this because this is not a political event.
This is, you know, this is me as a senator to all here.
But I can still talk on it, but I'm going to just make sure I focus in on some of the issues before us in Congress.
But the midterms are so important.
And I say this as someone who literally ran for office the first time when Trump was in the Oval Office and there was a Republican Senate and a Republican House.
So literally the reason why I am in politics and engaging is because of a situation similar to what we see now.
But I would venture to say, and I think many of you would agree, I find this moment to be even more dangerous by far than the experience that we were going through in 2017 and 2018.
And as a result, you know, we need to really be able to push on this and mobilize.
First and foremost, with the legislation that the gentleman was talking about, the SAVE Act, this is something that has become a major push by this administration and Republican leadership in Congress.
As mentioned, it is trying to, again, weaponize fear of voter fraud that is being manufactured, that isn't happening nearly to the level that they are talking about in terms of just the fundamental concern to our democracy.
And they are using this as a means to push an agenda that is in line with the broader ecosystem of things that this administration is pushing.
You have to think about it as another prong of this offense that they're doing in line with what they tried to do with gerrymandering in states across this country.
Literally cheating, literally doing things that are just trying to put things in their advantage.
This is another tool in that toolbox.
As mentioned, this would be a piece of legislation, for instance, that would require women who changed their names when they got married.
Now, if you want to register to vote, you have to bring your pay, you would have to be able to bring your birth certificate, you know, something that shows your previous name.
Not even a passport now would do because that doesn't verify your original name.
And just like just the depths to which it goes that is clearly singling out women in that type of way when it comes to that.
It would make it such that like, you know, you can't use a driver's license, even a real ID to be able to validate your ability to be able to register to vote.
It would require something like a passport for the rest of us.
And like, look, we're at a time when like less than half of Americans in this country have a passport right now.
And so just it's important to be able to just point out this is not a piece of legislation that is put forward in good faith.
This is something that is being weaponized, being pushed in a very dangerous way, trying to scare the electorate, trying to make it seem like that that is what's the threat to our democracy.
And you see that also utilized by Trump when he's talking about federalizing our elections.
Again, something in direct opposition to our Constitution.
And so, you know, these are the things that we have to be vigilant on.
I will say that there is a very extensive national effort on the political side, on the Democratic Party side, and more broadly with NGOs and others, that is in action, geared towards the midterms and the 28 election.
We saw it in action in the 24 election.
We saw it here in New Jersey with the governor's race, a significant number of attorneys and experts that are mobilizing.
And so, you know, is there more that we can do?
I'm sure that there is.
And I'm going to check in with this operation and see what can be pushed forward.
But I will say that as we have seen special election after special election all across this country over the last, you know, what, 14, 15 months, every single one of them showing a very strong lean against what this president is doing, double digits in Texas and elsewhere.
I will say that that gives me some hope that this is something that will not be hopefully a major concern.
We have not seen after those big losses by Republicans concerted efforts to challenge the results, a concerted effort to be able to discredit the results.
And that gives me some hope that this is hopefully not going to manifest in what we saw when it came to the 2020 election.
As someone who was there at the Capitol on January 6th, I never want to see our country go down that path again.
But I will make sure that I am vigilant on this.
It certainly concerns me.
But I want you to know that many people are focused on this.
And we hope to make sure we can mobilize what's needed to ensure the credibility of your vote.
Thank you.
Let's do some more.
Hi, I'm Donna Chair.
I can't hear you.
Can you check that mic?
Oh, check the mic.
Okay, I'm Donna Cherubini.
I live in Delanco, and I'm part of District 3.
And I got to tell you, 2018 was the most exciting campaign year.
You know, you had me at the Affordable Care Act that you, you know, were in favor of that.
I've been a nurse for 47 years.
I see what happens.
But there's so many things that I agree with you about.
And I just really love that you're a senator from New Jersey.
But I have to know, what were you thinking when you voted for Christy Noam?
I need to know that.
Yeah, okay, good.
Thank you.
Halal.
I'm right here.
We both walking.
Hi.
I'm a citizen of Asbury Park, and I have a question about bringing jobs to the community, this community, Asbury Park, especially for our young kids.
I have a 15-year-old son who's eager to work, and it's not really any jobs for any, not just him, but any young kids here in this city.
How do you feel about bringing jobs?
Let me take that in order.
So, first, thank you for coming up from South Jersey.
I'm really proud to be the first U.S. Senator from South Jersey.
I'm the first senator from South 195 in like seven decades and really want to make sure that I can shine a light on the challenges that are happening all across our state.
And as someone who represented the shore before as well, you know, wanting to lift up communities like Asbury.
You know, look, on your direct question about the Christy Noam vote, it was a complete mistake.
You know, I admit that.
You know, I was thinking it through as I'm a member of the Homeland Security Committee.
So, if you look at the others that Democrats have voted yes for the others are on the Homeland Committee, and what we were thinking about as a group is like, look, we know how dangerous things are going to be when it comes to immigration.
Can we try to be some bridge that can have some open communication with her?
Especially when I was thinking about the issues facing New Jersey.
Over 50% of the constituent service cases that my office gets are about the Department of Homeland Security in some way.
And I was thinking maybe there needs to be someone in this state that can get a hold of her.
And if there are crises and challenges that we face on immigration, at least one of us has a direct channel to her.
And so that's why I did the vote.
The Republicans already had enough votes to get her passed.
And I thought if I could at least try to deliver a channel that could maybe help some constituents down the road, that that was maybe worth it.
It was not.
And it was a mistake.
I mean, you know, and it's something that I'm learning from.
And I think, you know, just in general, I'm going to continue to do better.
And as I said, you know, I'm going to make some stumbles here and there.
But I hope you see me as someone who has the self-reflection and the humility to understand when I did something wrong and to earnestly fight to be able to try to fix it.
And so, you know, that's something that I'm going to try to do better on.
When it comes to the question about jobs, absolutely.
I mean, that needs to be at the top of the list of what we're trying to push forward on, especially when we're talking about different parts of New Jersey and making sure the growth we're seeing is everywhere, but also the right kind of growth, right?
You know, whether it's housing or jobs, I mean, you know, we're seeing, again, oftentimes it happening in such uneven ways, you know, and like when we're seeing what comes next when it comes to artificial intelligence.
I mean, the technology is certainly very impressive, but I have a real fear that this is only going to further the wealth inequality in this country, only further the challenges that we're seeing when it comes to jobs.
I worry that the jobs that it is likely to, the technology is likely to make obsolete are the jobs that are the backbone of the working class, of entry-level young people trying to get into white-collar jobs and others, and it's going to allow those that are the wealthiest to be able to continue to keep that money and wealth and continue to grow it.
Fearing Wealth Inequality00:02:08
So, you know, those are the things that we need to make sure we're focused on.
I am pushing right now on something that is about trying to spur innovation in our state.
I gave a speech about two months ago about something called building the Einstein corridor.
I've kind of dubbed it this idea of an Einstein quarter that we are a state of Albert Einstein.
We are a state of Thomas Edison.
We are a state that had led the world in terms of innovation.
Yes, we're still strong when it comes to life sciences, but we haven't been pushing in the way that I think we could be to be able to generate that kind of momentum and diversify the innovation that we're in.
For instance, this is something that I learned, and this is, you know, it might sound a little nerdy, but I've been learning about this industry called photonics.
Probably something that maybe not a lot of you have heard of before.
I didn't certainly know much about it, but this is the type of technology like fiber optic cables, like medical imaging, and so many other things that we see in different applications.
New Jersey has the largest and densest concentration of photonics companies in the entire world.
This is technology that can be incredibly transformative, something that came out from our leads on companies like Bell Labs and things that we can continue to push on.
That's something that I'm trying to grow and trying to make sure.
And if you look at it, we're able to get people trained in our community colleges straight into these businesses.
It's something that isn't just for the elites.
This is something that can create mobility.
Those are the things that I'm trying to push on.
But again, always being mindful about how we grow and making sure that this isn't going to further concentrate wealth and opportunity, but this is something that can hopefully expand it.
So please keep an eye on some of these projects I'm doing.
I think Asbury has a great opportunity to be able to really take advantage of this.
We see the investments that's happening in the film industry down the road.
Asbury is a place that's drawing in a lot of young people and mobilizing a lot of interest in that type of way of people coming in to this community.
Creating Mobility00:02:11
Again, we need to do it in the right way, though.
That isn't something that's going to hurt those of us that are already here, those of you who are already here.
This needs to be something that is being thoughtful as we push forward.
I hope to continue to work with all of you on that.
Thank you.
Hi, Senator Kim, Jeff Laurenti from Trenton.
I appreciate very much your having introduced the question of Iran into the public debate because it is quite shocking that official Washington seems to be like a deer staring into the headlights, not acknowledging that the Trump administration is intent on a massive war.
At least George Bush had bothered to ask Congress for a resolution to authorize his invasion.
He had even bothered to ask the UN Security Council.
Trump has done neither, none of this, and yet the Congress is indifferent.
And I hope that perhaps the proposed war powers resolution that Tim Kaine and others are offering will be, can somehow get traction.
But this points to the larger problem, since this is being billed to us as nuclear nonproliferation.
And just 10 days ago, the Trump administration allowed the last set of restrictions on nuclear arsenals of the United States and Russia to expire.
And Trump said, if it expires, it expires.
And they are evidently looking now to restart nuclear weapons testing that we haven't had since in some 35 years.
Can the Congress put in legislative requirements, mandates that the U.S. continue to observe the new start limits, as long as Russia does, and to prohibit nuclear testing?
And are there vehicles that are, quote, must have legislative vehicles in order to force this, I don't want to say force it down Trump's throat, but to force him to have to accept it.
Affordability and Homelessness00:04:30
Hi, my name is Yolanda Curry, and I'm calling about two things.
Excuse me, and I'm right, I'm talking about two things, affordability and homelessness.
I am a U.S. ex-vet, and I look at a lot of my vets.
We get together, and we talk about homeless all the time.
And the sad part about it is that you have a lot of vacant buildings, empty buildings.
Why don't you get with these CEOs and tell them stop building these and reinvent some of these other buildings and get the homeless people to do the job too?
And they can work with them.
And they have a job and they have a place to live.
Because the way things are going right now, we're all going to be somewhere looking for something.
And I, and you know me, I speak what I feel because I feel that right now, a lot of my friends who are veterans.
We get together, we talk about different issues, and we try to do it.
I advocate by myself.
I do have some friends that when we see homeless people, we feed them.
We try to give them a place to stay.
I can't give you nothing because I have no organization, but I do want to see something come out of this where these empty buildings can be buildings that are now furnished with people who can have a place to call home.
I'm going to take a few more and I'll just do them all together.
Now?
Okay.
Hi, Senator Kim.
My name is Martha Hickson.
I'm a resident of Little Egg Harbor, but you and I first met in a different part of the state when I lived in the town of Washington up in Warren County.
My issue then is the same as my issue now, and that is the First Amendment, which I think is at the foundation of just about everything that's been mentioned here tonight.
This town hall is a vivid example of the First Amendment in action.
And almost two years ago to the day, I was very privileged to have you attend my town hall.
And that town hall was necessitated by the fact that I was a high school librarian under attack as book banners tried to remove books from my school library, books having to do with people of color and LGBTQ plus individuals.
School librarians were really the canary in the coal mine as far as censorship goes.
We've seen Pan America tells us that since 2021, more than 23,000 books have been banned in U.S. schools.
And what started in schools has now morphed.
You know, it turned into don't say gay in Florida.
Now it's don't say Plato in Texas universities.
Our president is having the Smithsonian Institution send its exhibits to him for his approval.
We're seeing journalists being stifled and even popular entertainment.
Just look at Jimmy Kimmel or Stephen Colbert.
It is a great concern.
Censorship is not a partisan issue.
Large majorities of people on both sides of the political aisle are opposed to it.
And so what I'd like to know is: what are you and your peers doing to reach across the aisle to shore up, protect, and preserve the First Amendment rights of every person in this country to speak, read, and think freely.
My name is Makarant Bidwais.
Senator, thank you for this opportunity.
I'm going to touch base between the social security question and the DHS.
You know, there is a union of those two problems.
I have personally contributed to social security for over 10 years.
I was eligible to get my pension three months ago.
They denied it to me because I was a whistleblower, H-1B whistleblower, and I went out of status.
I reached out to the DHS director himself, Alexandro Mariokos, the predecessor for Christy Noam, and he said, My problem is Congress's problem because I'm an H-1B whistleblower and there is no provision to accommodate my immigration status.
And at the same time, my contribution in social security, which is going to dry out in 2033, I'm already feeling that it's dried out.
I'm not getting anything.
I have reached out to constituent services.
They have already acknowledged that there is a legislative gap.
Sheer Volume of Struggles00:01:16
So what would you propose to accommodate?
Because on the one side, I have done everything legally and I have been in a limbo.
And my wife, suppose something were to happen to me, she would get the pension.
I have two U.S. citizen daughters too.
They would get the pension.
But right now, my wife is in the same limbo.
So I'm requesting a legislative pathway.
Yeah, no, thanks.
Thanks for that.
Let me just start there.
I mean, if you don't, have you already talked to my team about this?
Amanda, okay, let me follow up with Amanda and just get a little bit more detail from what she's been able to do.
And just writ large, like, you know, I'm glad you raised this because a huge part of what I do is on the constituent service side.
You know, I think so often people think about my job as primarily down in DC for the hearings and whatnot, but you know, like a huge part of my staff is here in New Jersey.
And you know, you can imagine just the sheer volume of people that are struggling, whether from on the veteran side and the VA and the challenges there.
And, you know, I'll get to your question in a second.
But so let me get a little bit more details about this and some of the details.