Former U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke
California Democratic Party State Convention
San Francisco, CA
June 1, 2019

[DEMOCRACY IN ACTION Transcript]

Muy buenos días. [inaud.] Gracias a ustedes. Es un honore está aquí. Tenemos los retos mas grandes en la historia de este país. Necesitamos...[opens speech in Spanish for about 50 seconds]

But to meet these challenges of the climate, of health care, of an economy that should work for everyone, we cannot meet this by half measures or by half steps or by winning half the country.

It is going to take all of us doing all that we can, together for the future of this great country; it's going to necessitate that we make this democracy work and count for all of us.

And we've got our work cut out for us.

We have a president who seeks to further divide an already polarized country, who undermines this democracy at every single step to further his own power and his own control.

But you, California Democrats, have offered the rest of the country an example. Last year we saw the greatest participation in the Democratic primaries in this state in decades. You flipped seven congressional districts, produced a new majority in the House of Representatives, and you made Nancy Pelosi the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

And in Texas we were right there with you. Last year I led the largest grassroots effort in the history of our state. Without a single dime from a single political action committee, we traveled to every single one of the 254 counties of Texas, listening to and learning from those who we sought to serve and to represent, and showing up with the courage of our convictions. A bold, progressive agenda for everyone in that state—Democrat, Independent and Republican.

In a [inaud.] state, we talked about universal background checks and ending the sale of weapons of war into our communities.

In what was thought to be a state that was too red for a Democrat to compete in, we talked about universal, guaranteed, high quality health care, primary health care, mental health care, and ensuring that every woman makes her own decisions about her own body, and has access to the care that makes that possible.

Y ademas hablamos sobre a schoolhouse to jailhouse pipeline that begins not by school but in kindergarten where a four or five year old child, if she is a child of color, is five times as likely to be disciplined or suspended or expelled as a white child.

So when we talk about justice in this country it is not only ending the war on drugs and ending the prohibition on marijuana and expunging the arrest record for everyone arrested for the possession for something that is legal in most states in this country. It is squarely confronting the consequences of slavery and segregation and suppression that [inaud.] in this country. Unless we do that we will never repair the damage done and we will never stop revisiting these injustices on every successive generation.

So let's bring the full force of this American democracy to bear on the challenges of the country before us right now.

As president, I will sign into law a new Voting Rights Act so that every single one of us is counted and every voice is heard; same day automatic voter registration, and no more gerrymandering, so the people not the members of Congress choose their districts and who will represent them.

But let's take this a step further. This week, we introduced a bold immigration plan for the United States of America that seeks to ensure that everyone who is responsible for building the success of this great country has a seat at the table.

We start with more than nine million legal permanent residents, make sure that we waive their fees for citizenship, send them already filled out application forms and make them U.S. citizens as soon as humanly possible.

And more than 11 million of our fellow Americans, undocumented, working some of the toughest jobs in this country that no one born in this country is willing to work right now, we bring them out of the shadows. We begin with the Dreamers, never again fearing deportation to a country they did not know because we make them citizens in this, their true home country.

And we will end the chaos that Donald Trump has created at the U.S.-Mexico border. Never again will we put another child in another cage, nor will we deport another mother back to the very country from which she fled in the first place. We will treat those asylum seekers with the dignity and respect they deserve as our fellow human beings.

We will live up to our potential and this country will fulfill her promise and we will do it together.  Because that is the only way that we defeat Donald Trump in November of 2020 and it is the only way that we bring this great country back together again in January of 2021.

It is an honor to be here with you today. I ask for your support and your help to become the next president of the United States of America.

[inaud.] gracias. Adios. Thank you California.

_____________
Ed. notes: O'Rourke opened by speaking in Spanish for about 50 seconds. Toward the end he summarized his recently introduced immigration plan.

Trump mentions by name: 2.


Harris  |  Booker  |  O'Rourke  |  Warren  ||  Gillibrand   |  Gabbard  |  Buttigieg  |  Swalwell  |   Klobuchar  |  Hickenlooper  |  Inslee  ||  Sanders  |  Castro  |  Delaney