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Forbes Breaking News
  • 5 months ago
Texas State Rep. Jolanda Jones (D) fired back at Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) over arrest threats as Democrats fled the state to avoid a vote on redistricting.
Transcript
00:00So let me be clear. I'm a criminal. I'm a lawyer. A part of my practice is
00:06criminal defense work. There is no felony in the Texas Penal Code for what
00:11he says. So respectfully, he's making up some shit, okay? He's trying to get
00:16sound bites and he has no legal mechanism. And if he did, subpoenas from
00:23Texas don't work in New York. So he gonna come get us how? Subpoenas in Texas
00:27don't work in Chicago. He's gonna come get us how? So let me be clear. He's putting
00:33up smoke and mirrors, and I'm hopeful that the media doesn't follow that. I will
00:38also say this. I was on the redistricting committee. I sat in on the meetings. We
00:43had three sham hearings with no maps, with no maps, where people were forced to
00:51testify that they were neutral on the maps because of our processes, when
00:55actually, I would say about 99.9% of the people were against it. So they set it up.
01:03So when the litigation happens, because it's going to happen, trust and
01:08believe, right, that there will be testimony saying that everybody was
01:13neutral on it. Which is, excuse my French, a damn lie. Then when they got the map on
01:19Wednesday, and let me be clear, it was the worst kept secret in Texas. I was on the
01:24redistricting committee, and I was wondering in January, why I'm on the
01:28redistricting committee? I mean, it ain't a redistricting year, and we didn't meet
01:33once, right? But this was always the backup plan. Always. I sat in on the
01:40hearings. It was a joke. The chair of the redistricting committee, Cody
01:45with suit is a lawyer. In the legislature, he is the expert on points of order. He
01:52knows the law. Cody pays attention to detail. During the redistricting
01:57committee meetings, well, I hadn't looked at, I hadn't looked at anything. I don't
02:01know. I ain't seen no maps. Yeah. Uh-huh. Whatever you say. So you pin on me, and you're
02:07telling me it's raining, and you expect me to believe it. Wrong answer. When they
02:11finally had the one public hearing with the map, and the secret was out, the
02:21stuff is gonna get filed on Wednesday, and we're gonna have a marathon hearing on
02:24Friday, is what they said. The plan was filed on Wednesday, and they had a 10-hour
02:31meeting on Friday. And the thing that was the most offensive to me, as a person who
02:36went to these and asked questions about these, and let me be clear, the districts
02:41that are targeted overwhelmingly are black districts. Okay? They are pitting
02:47Jasmine Crockett against Mark Vesey, and they are pitting Al Green against CD18,
02:53where there's a black representative. If you don't know who sat in CD18, I live in
02:57CD18, by the way. Barbara Jordan, Mickey Leland, Craig Washington, Sheila Jackson Lee,
03:02and Sylvester Turner. So those are the people they're trying to take out. So I'm real
03:06upset about it, and my constituents are real upset about it. But it's really
03:11interesting that the map person, who says that some law firm drafted the maps, and he
03:18don't know that much about the maps, I felt like I was in a bad edition of an
03:24episode of White Man's Burden. For the most part, he told us, grown people speaking
03:28to us as if we were kids, said to us, you need to be happy. We didn't have to give you
03:33any hearings in the first place, and we know what's best for you. Well, I
03:36respectfully submit that they don't know what's best for us. They do not know
03:41what's best for us. And let me also be clear, my constituents demanded that I be
03:46here. So you think I'm gonna listen to Donald Trump, and Greg Abbott, and Dan
03:51Patrick, and the Attorney General, who can't treat his wife right, and who lies
03:56on documentation. So I think he need to worry about going to jail. But my point is
04:01this. We, the Democratic contingent, we are paying attention to what our
04:08constituents are demanding of us. They've literally told us, if you don't
04:11corn break, we will primary you. That's how important it is. This is, people wonder,
04:17why should New York be concerned about what's going on in Texas? Why should
04:21anywhere be concerned with going on in Texas? I'm gonna tell you why. My grandmother
04:25says this, if you allow yourself to be a rug, people will step on you. No one was
04:30paying attention in North Carolina in 2024. There were seven Republican
04:34Congress people. There were seven Democratic Congress people. Guess what?
04:38The Republicans rigged the game in North Carolina, and they took three seats. I'm
04:45gonna say this one more again. That's Ebonics for those of y'all who don't speak it.
04:48They took three seats. Congress has a three Republican majority. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. So we
04:56weren't paying attention to what was going on in North Carolina. And look what we
05:00have. We got that big, ugly, terrible bill shoved down our throats. So guess
05:06what? I was paying attention. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
05:10Texas will not be North Carolina. We will not give him what we need. And we're
05:15marching. We ain't fleeing. We're fighting. And we are so incredibly thankful that the
05:22governor, that the governor has hosted us because we need allies.
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