Vice President Kamala Harris delivered remarks on Thursday at the American Federation of Teachers' 88th National Convention.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Good morning, AFT. Good morning. Oh my goodness, it's so good to be with everyone. Please have a seat. Please have a seat. If you have a seat, please have a seat.
00:13It is good to be in the House of Labor.
00:42Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, thank you all. Thank you so very much.
01:01Can we hear it for Brittany, please?
01:08Thank you. It's so wonderful to be back with everyone here. Thank you. That means so much more than I can say.
01:15Randy, thank you for your friendship, your longstanding friendship.
01:20As we all know, Randy is a force, and she has been an incredible friend and an advisor to the president and me.
01:29And I want to thank you on behalf of the president and me and our country for all that you are.
01:38And I want to begin by saying a few words about our president, Joe Biden.
01:43You know, right? Yeah. Yeah.
01:49So last night, our president addressed the nation and he showed once again what true leadership looks like.
01:59He really did. His his words were poignant.
02:03You know, I'll speak in a moment about the importance of reminding people of history, teaching America's true history.
02:10He he thinks and talks about his work and our country, understanding what it means in terms of what we do now and how that will impact the future.
02:22He thinks about our history in the context of the importance of the work we do now.
02:28And over the past three and a half years and over his entire career, Joe has led with grace and strength and bold vision and deep compassion.
02:41And as he said. That's right.
02:46And as he said in the next six months, he will continue to fight for the American people.
02:51And I know we are all deeply, deeply grateful for his continued service to our nation.
03:00Thank you. Thank you.
03:04And to the members of AFT, I thank you for your service to our nation.
03:16From the public service workers and higher education faculty to the school bus drivers and the custodians to the school nurses and our teachers,
03:27you all do God's work, educating our children, the whole ecosystem of who are AFT members.
03:36It is you who have taken on the most noble of work, which is to concern yourself with the well-being of the children of America.
03:45And I thank you for that. I thank you for that.
03:52And I thank you also for your support over the years and for being the first union to endorse me this week.
04:10Thank you. I thank you.
04:14I thank you.
04:18And as you may know, I am a proud product of public education.
04:26Many of you know that my first grade teacher, Mrs. Francis Wilson, God rest her soul, taught me and educated me and encouraged me and inspired me.
04:41And years later, when I walked across the stage to receive my law school diploma, Mrs. Francis Wilson was in the audience.
04:55And that's who you are. I know who you are. I know who you are.
05:00This work is personal. And it is professional. And it is so critically important.
05:07And so it is because of Mrs. Wilson and so many teachers like her that I stand before you as Vice President of the United States of America.
05:16And that I am running to become President of the United States of America.
05:42And what I know firsthand is that our teachers and all those who are here, all the members of AFT, I know that by nature you are visionaries.
05:55You are focused on the future. The work you do is about a focus on the future.
06:01You see the potential in every child. You foster it. You encourage it. And in so doing, you shape the future of our nation.
06:13Which is why I say we need you so desperately right now.
06:19Today, we face a choice between two very different visions for our nation.
06:28One focused on the future. And the other focused on the past.
06:34And we are fighting for the future.
06:45And in our vision of the future, we see a place where every person has the opportunity not just to get by, but to get ahead.
06:54A future where no child has to grow up in poverty.
06:59Where every senior can retire with dignity.
07:03And where every worker has the freedom to join a union.
07:19We see a future with affordable healthcare, affordable childcare, and paid leave.
07:27Not for some, but for all.
07:35We see a future where every student has the support and the resources they need to thrive.
07:41And a future where no teacher has to struggle with the burden of student loan debt.
07:52So as an example, our administration has forgiven student loan debt for nearly 5 million Americans.
08:02And twice as much for our public servants, including our teachers.
08:12Teachers like Tanya Cabeza, who I met recently in Philadelphia.
08:16Tanya was first in her family to go to college.
08:19And she had been, like many, paying off her student loans for 20 years.
08:25And she told me, she was like, look, I at many times wondered, would I have to leave this profession I love to just be able to pay my bills?
08:35But I did it. I didn't leave.
08:37Because I love what I do and I understand the importance.
08:40But making decisions then about what she could afford in terms of her daily obligations and dealing with these loans.
08:48And after 20 years, she still owed $40,000 in student loans.
08:54And we forgave it all.
09:01When she learned, she told me, she said when she learned that her loans had been forgiven, she said, well, me and my children knew our lives had changed.
09:08And we were just dancing, dancing.
09:12So there we go.
09:13But we are clear eyed.
09:16As we work to build a brighter future and to move our nation forward.
09:22There are those who are really trying to take us backward.
09:27And you, I'm sure, have seen their agenda.
09:30Project 2025.
09:36Randy, can you believe they put that thing in writing?
09:42900 pages in writing.
09:46Project 2025 is a plan to return America to a dark past.
09:54Donald Trump and his extreme allies want to take our nation back to failed trickle down economic policies.
10:05Back to union busting.
10:10Back to tax breaks for billionaires.
10:15Donald Trump and his allies want to cut Medicare and Social Security.
10:21To stop student loan forgiveness for teachers and other public servants.
10:28And I say to AFT, they even want to eliminate the Department of Education.
10:36And end Head Start.
10:40Which of course would take away preschool from hundreds of thousands of our children.
10:46He intends to give tax breaks to billionaires and big corporations and make working families foot the bill.
10:53And he intends to end the Affordable Care Act.
10:56Now think about that.
10:57To take us back to a time when insurance companies had the power to deny people with pre-existing conditions.
11:04Remember what that was like?
11:06Children with asthma.
11:08Women who survived breast cancer.
11:10Grandparents with diabetes.
11:14You know, America has tried these failed economic policies before.
11:20But we are not going back.
11:22We are not going back.
11:32No, we will move forward.
11:36And one of the best ways to keep our nation moving forward is to give workers a voice.
11:43To protect the freedom to organize.
11:46To defend the freedom to collectively bargain.
11:51To end union busting.
12:00As head of the White House Labor Task Force, I have led our work to eliminate barriers to organizing in both public and private sectors.
12:08Including for teachers.
12:10But there is more that we must do.
12:12President Joe Biden and I promised to sign the PRO Act into law.
12:16And I promise you I will keep that promise.
12:25Because when workers join together and demand what is fair, everyone is better off.
12:34Understand, and I say this everywhere I go, understand.
12:38You may not be a union member, but you should thank unions.
12:43And I'm looking to the cameras in the back of the room.
12:46Not them, but the people who might be watching.
12:50You may not be a union member.
12:52But thank unions for the five-day workweek.
13:00For the eight-hour workday.
13:05Thank unions for sick leave and paid family leave and vacation time.
13:16Because the fact is, unions helped build America's middle class.
13:24And when unions are strong, America is strong.
13:38So AFT, ours is a fight for the future.
13:43And ours is a fight for freedom.
13:47In this moment across our nation, we witness a full-on attack on hard-won, hard-fought freedoms.
13:56While you teach students about democracy and representative government, extremists attack the sacred freedom to vote.
14:08While you try to create safe and welcoming places where our children can learn, extremists attack our freedom to live safe from gun violence.
14:21They have the nerve to tell teachers to strap on a gun in the classroom.
14:29While they refuse to pass common-sense gun safety laws.
14:40And while you teach students about our nation's past, these extremists attack the freedom to learn and acknowledge our nation's true and full history.
14:54Including book bans.
14:57Book bans in this year of our Lord, 2024.
15:04And on these last two issues, on these last two issues, just think about it.
15:10So we want to ban assault weapons, and they want to ban books.
15:18Can you imagine?
15:22All the while, these extremists also attack the freedom to love who you love openly and with pride.
15:35They pass so-called don't-say-gay laws.
15:40Now I have to tell you, so many of you may know, in 2004, on Valentine's Day weekend, I was one of the first elected officials in the country to perform same-sex marriages.
15:55So here's the thing.
16:04It pains me so to think 20 years later that there are some young teachers in their 20s who are afraid to put up a photograph of themselves and their partner for fear they could lose their job.
16:23And what is their job? The most noble of work? Teaching other people's children.
16:29And God knows we don't pay you enough as it is.
16:36In this moment, we are in a fight for our most fundamental freedoms.
16:43And to this room of leaders, I say, bring it on.
16:51Bring it on.
16:55Bring it on.
17:07Bring it on.
17:21That's right.
17:23Because here's the thing.
17:29We believe in our country.
17:33We believe in its promise of freedom.
17:37And the American people believe in the promise of freedom.
17:42So we are in the fight.
17:45We who believe in the freedom to vote will pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act.
17:57We who believe in the freedom to live safe from gun violence will pass an assault weapons ban.
18:08We who believe that every American should be free from bigotry and hate will fight to protect our teachers and our students from discrimination.
18:21And make sure every student can learn America's history.
18:28And we who believe in reproductive freedom will restore the freedom of a woman to make decisions about her own body and not have her government telling her what to do.
18:57So AFT, that's right, bring it on.
19:04So ultimately in this moment, I know we all know, we each in our country face a question.
19:15That question being what kind of country do we want to live in?
19:23A country of freedom, compassion, and rule of law?
19:28Or a country of chaos, fear, and hate?
19:35The beauty of our democracy is that we each have the power to answer that question.
19:44When we vote.
19:46And when we vote, we make our voices heard.
19:51So today I ask you AFT, are you ready to make your voices heard?
19:58Do we believe in freedom?
20:01Do we believe in opportunity?
20:05Do we believe in the promise of America?
20:09And are we ready to fight for it?
20:14And when we fight, we win.
20:17God bless you and God bless the United States of America.