LEADER JEFFRIES: “HEALTHCARE IS A RIGHT THAT SHOULD BE AVAILABLE TO EVERY SINGLE AMERICAN”

Today, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries spoke at the Interfaith Rally and Vigil for Health Justice, where he underscored the vitality of protecting the healthcare of the American people in the face of the Republican healthcare crisis.

LEADER JEFFRIES: Are we here to save healthcare?

Are you ready to hold the line?

Are we in this fight until we win this fight on behalf of the American people?

What an honor and a privilege to be here with all of you. Certainly so thankful for all of our faith leaders for your support, for the leadership, the partnership, the friendship, for organizing this convening, organizing this vigil, lending your powerful moral voices to this existential struggle that we are waging on behalf of the American people. It's also a blessing to be with all of you, joined by my colleagues in government, who you will hear from, including Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, the legendary Nancy Pelosi, a great woman of faith, and, of course, my good friend and colleague, the Democratic Whip, Katherine Clark.

Now, I grew up in the Cornerstone Baptist Church in Brooklyn, New York, and my mom would take my younger brother and I to Sunday school each and every week. In fact, we used to think growing up, every week, every week, every month, every year that we were mailmen for Christ. Because it didn't matter if it was raining, snowing, sleeting or hailing. If it was Sunday morning, we were going to church. And that was the foundation that was laid for us from the very beginning. And I grew up in church learning, of course, that what the Bible teaches us is to stand up for the least amongst us-the lost, the left-behind, those whose station in life may not have always dealt them the best of hands. And unfortunately, what we're dealing with right now in the United States Congress is a group of people who sometimes say they go to church and they pray on Sunday, but then they come to Washington, D.C., and they prey, P-R-E-Y, on the American people for the rest of the week. Prey on the poor, prey on the sick, prey on the afflicted. But we believe in an America of the people, by the people and for the people, which is why we're standing up for the healthcare of the American people, today and at all times.

Scripture tells us in Second Corinthians, the fourth chapter. By the way, that's Second Corinthians, not Two Corinthians. Mr. President, if you're gonna sell the Bible, you should know the Bible. Second Corinthians, the fourth chapter, eighth verse, the Scripture tells us, the Apostle Paul writes, 'We are troubled on every side, but not distressed. Perplexed, but never in despair.'

Certainly, I think it's fair to say that we've got trouble all around us. A hater in the White House. Haters in the Congress. Haters throughout the Cabinet. Trouble all around us. But we're not distressed. Because we believe in the resilience and the goodness of the American people. And that's why we're so thankful for all of you in this fight, standing with us Democrats in the House and the Senate, a separate and co-equal branch of government. We understand we don't work for Donald Trump. We don't work for JD Vance. We don't work for Elon Musk. We don't work for their billionaire donors. We work for all of you, the American people. And we're determined to stand up to protect their healthcare, to stand up for Medicaid, stand up for our hospitals, stand up for our nursing homes, stand up for our community-based health clinics, stand up for the Affordable Care Act, stand up for the principle that in America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, healthcare can't simply be a privilege for the wealthy and the well-off. Healthcare is a right that should be available to every single American. And that's what this fight is all about.

And so, as I close, let me simply lean into the words of a great man of God and great civil rights leader, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who led a great movement, interfaith religious movement, brought the American people together across the divides that may artificially be put upon us. And in those early days of the Civil Rights Movement, when people saw trouble on every side, concerned that it wouldn't be possible to break the authoritarianism that was the Jim Crow South at the time. Dr. King gathered some folks in March of 1956, just a few months after Rosa Parks sat down so that everybody else could stand up. He gathered folks in the basement of the Concord Baptist Church in Brooklyn, New York, and others were concerned and anxious as to whether they could win the fight that they were involved in at the time. And he said, 'No matter what the odds are, we have to press on and keep pressing.' And what Dr. King said is that 'If you can't fly, run. If you can't run, walk. If you can't walk, crawl. But at all times, press on and keep pressing.'

So I just dropped by today to say, as Dr. King once echoed prophetically, that we've just got to press on in this fight. Press on for our children, press on for our seniors, press on for our veterans, press on for our unions, press on for people of faith, press on for the healthcare of the American people, press on for nutritional assistance, press on for the proposition that everybody should have a fair shot in this country to live the American dream, press on for working-class folk, press on for the middle class, press on for the poor, press on for the sick, press on for the afflicted, press on for the least, press on for the lost, press on for the left-behind, press on for social justice, press on for racial justice, press on for healthcare justice, press on for economic justice, press on for freedom, press on for liberty, press on for democracy, press on in this healthcare fight until victory is won.

Press on.

Full remarks at the rally can be watched here.

###