Young Oak Kim: “I rise today because I literally, just about 2 minutes ago, finished a telephone townhall with over 5,000 people back…”

“I rise today because I literally, just about 2 minutes ago, finished a telephone townhall with over 5,000 people back home in New Jersey that joined up to try to figure out what in the world is happening to our government right now, when they see just this abdication of leadership from the White House to leadership here in Congress, and to step up right now at a time of need. Thousands of people from across New Jersey who have called in worried about how this shutdown is going to affect their lives, how the healthcare costs that they are going to be experiencing are going to reshape their ability to be able to deliver care for those that need care the most. The simple story is they are scared. The people I talked to were nervous about what comes next. And, frankly, they are pissed off about this. They know that this is not how a government should function. They know that, yes, we need to be able to step up and have negotiations. But how can you have negotiations when one Chamber of this Congress hasn't even shown up to work this week. That is right. When I told them about how Speaker Johnson didn't even bring the House of Representatives to work this week, even though they were supposed to, they were furious.”