00:00Thank you, Dr. Tiffany Clark. I don't know where you are, but thank you for being one of the greatest
00:05champions for public education in this state.
00:08Thank you to DeMarcus Offer, your next Dallas County clerk.
00:17And thank you to my colleague, my friend, Representative Ayesha Davis.
00:23I just want to say something. In the Texas legislature, freshmen are meant to be seen and not heard.
00:32But in Ayesha's first term, every time I looked up from my desk, she was up there passing some major
00:40legislation.
00:41She was way more productive than I was in my freshman term.
00:46Y'all are so lucky to have a champion like Ayesha Davis in the halls of power in Austin, Texas.
00:56And thank you all for showing up to this important conversation.
01:01We are building a movement to take back our state and take back our country.
01:06We are uniting Texans onto one team to take on this broken, corrupt political system.
01:14We have recruited more than 59,000 volunteers who are going to be doing the organizing work in communities across
01:24this state.
01:25We have shattered grassroots fundraising records all without taking a dime from corporate PACs.
01:32This is a people-powered campaign.
01:37And we have traveled to every corner of this state, from Beaumont to El Paso, from Amarillo to Brownsville, and
01:46to right here in DeSoto, Texas.
01:48And we are holding conversations just like this one.
01:52These conversations are shaping the movement that we are building together.
01:57Campaigns should be collaborative.
01:59It should be a partnership between the candidate and the people that that candidate seeks to represent.
02:05That's what these town halls are all about.
02:09But there is no way to win Texas without black Texans.
02:13There is no way to represent this state without showing up for, investing in, and listening to black communities.
02:25And as the next U.S. Senator from Texas, I will represent more African Americans than any other senator in
02:34the country.
02:35And that work starts in the campaign, not after Election Day.
02:42And that is why we have been convening roundtable discussions with black business leaders, black elected officials, black community leaders,
02:52black faith leaders.
02:53It's why we've been worshiping in black churches.
02:57Yesterday in Houston, I visited three churches in one Sunday morning.
03:01My granddad was a Baptist preacher and told me I could never leave during a service.
03:06And I was a little nervous jumping from so many churches, but they told me it was all right.
03:11It's why we've been visiting our black-owned businesses all over the state of Texas.
03:16It's why we have been rolling out policy proposals that meet the needs of black communities, including working, I don't
03:25know if my colleague, if my colleague Tony Rose is still here.
03:28She's here.
03:29The legend, your Tony Rose.
03:35Y'all know that Representative Rose passed historic legislation to address the maternal mortality crisis in this state.
03:44And she and I worked together to put together a comprehensive plan to attack this maternal mortality crisis that is
03:53three times deadlier for black women in this state at the federal level.
03:58And, and I hope we can talk more about some of those policy plans in just a minute, it's also
04:03why we've been visiting our HBCUs.
04:05We held a town hall at Prairie View, and then I was, and then I was honored to give the
04:12commencement address at Paul Quinn College up here in North Texas, the oldest HBCU in the state.
04:21It's why we've been doing interviews with black media, Dallas Weekly, Houston Defender, the Tashara Parker show, and also on
04:31the podcast where younger folks are listening in social media spaces.
04:36We've been showing up where people are, so they can hear directly from me, and that work is going to
04:42continue.
04:43This town hall is the beginning of a conversation, not the end of one.
04:48And we're going to open this up for your comments and questions in just a second.
04:51But before we do that, I just want to give you a sense of why I do this work.
04:58Because for me, politics and policy is deeply personal.
05:04Before I was a politician, I was a public school teacher on the west side of San Antonio.
05:09I taught sixth grade language arts at Rhodes Middle School.
05:14I often say that teaching middle school is the best preparation for politics.
05:19If you've taught middle school or you've had a middle schooler, you understand.
05:23I entered the classroom in the fall of 2011, right after the Texas legislature cut more than $5 billion from
05:35our public schools.
05:36I saw the impact of those cuts firsthand.
05:40I had 45 kids in one classroom.
05:43There weren't enough desks for all of my students, so I had kids sitting on the air conditioning unit.
05:50In the wealthiest country in human history, in the 21st century, children sitting on the air conditioning unit.
05:59And that got me mad.
06:01Righteous anger, Pastor King.
06:06I ended up leading a local education nonprofit that was helping low-income schools like the one I taught in.
06:12And then when a seat in that very same legislature opened up in my hometown of Round Rock, Texas, I
06:20threw my hat in the ring.
06:21I was 28 years old.
06:23I had never run for office before.
06:25I was a Democrat running in a Trump district.
06:28In a county that was so red, it hadn't voted for a Democrat for president since Jimmy Carter.
06:34However, I was told by the powers that be in the Democratic Party that the race was a lost cause.
06:41I was told flipping a Trump district like that was impossible.
06:45I was told I was too young.
06:47I was told I didn't have the money or the political connections to win.
06:51But my neighbors and I gathered in rooms like this.
06:55We ran an aggressive, authentic, unorthodox campaign that brought people together.
07:02And on election night, we flipped that district with 51% of the vote.
07:09And by the way, the only reason I'm standing before you in my fourth term in the Texas House is
07:16because we had historic black turnout in my district in 2018.
07:20We have the opportunity.
07:23We have the opportunity to do that again in this race if we do it right.
07:28And that's what this conversation today is all about.
07:31In my four terms, I have passed 60 bipartisan bills in a Republican-dominated legislature.
07:39Bills that raise teacher pay, that lower the cost of housing and child care and prescription drugs, including insulin.
07:46I've also gone toe-to-toe with the Republican extremists who are trying to defund our public schools with a
07:53private school voucher scam.
07:54I have defended our students from bills that would ban books, that would whitewash our curriculum, that would go after
08:05our teachers and our librarians.
08:07And then last summer, my colleagues here, Representative Davis, Representative Rose, we broke quorum to shine a national spotlight on
08:15their redistricting power grab.
08:21Which is systematically diluting the voting power of black and brown Texans all over the state.
08:30Just in the last 12 months, we have seen the most aggressive attack on black political power since Jim Crow.
08:38The rulings from the Supreme Court, the gutting of the Voting Rights Act, these racist redistricting maps, the stakes for
08:45this election could not be higher.
08:48This is why I'm running, because these fights that we've been waging at the state capitol are now more urgent
08:55than they've ever been before.
08:56A few months ago, I'll close with this.
08:59A few months ago, I visited Sand Branch, Texas, a community just south of here without any running water.
09:08My volunteers and I came together to drop off packs of bottled water for the residents in Sand Branch.
09:16They have been failed by leaders in Washington, D.C.
09:21So much of our money has gone to billionaire tax breaks and new forever wars in the Middle East, and
09:28none of it is coming back home for communities like Sand Branch.
09:31We are closing schools and hospitals in this country so we can bomb schools and hospitals in other countries.
09:42There is never enough money for education and health care, but there's always enough money for war.
09:51This morning, this morning we learned that one of our own, Private Isabella Gonzalez, was killed by an Iranian airstrike
10:02in Jordan.
10:03Isabella grew up in Carrollton, not too far from here.
10:07She was just 19 years old.
10:11She just graduated from Hebron High School.
10:14Isabella was sent to serve in a reckless war that no one asked for.
10:21We pay for it with our tax dollars.
10:25Isabella paid for it with her life.
10:27There is no greater love of country than to lay down your own life for it.
10:34Isabella died a hero and a patriot.
10:38We are grateful for her service and her sacrifice, but our gratitude for her service should not be mistaken for
10:45an acceptance of her death.
10:53We should not be sending our brave young men and women like Isabella off to die in another forever war.
11:02Our service members love this country.
11:04It's time for this country to love them back.
11:11This underscores the stakes of this election.
11:14We have a lot of work to do, DeSoto, a lot of work to do.
11:17I, as the candidate, have a lot of work to do.
11:20We, as a campaign, have a lot of work to do.
11:22But if we do that work, if we do it together, we are going to do something extraordinary in November
11:29of this year.
11:30We are going to end 30 years of one-party rule and elect a senator who's going to serve all
11:36of us.
11:40All right, that's enough of me talking.
11:43I now want to open this up for your comments, your questions.
11:46I am a former middle school teacher, so if you don't raise your hands, I'm just going to call on
11:50you.
11:50So my only ask is when you ask your question, introduce yourself.
11:55I know a lot of people in this room, but not everybody.
11:57So tell us your name and then ask your question or share your comment or your idea or your story,
12:03whatever's on your mind.
12:04I think we took 10 questions in Houston yesterday.
12:07We've got to do better than that, DeSoto.
12:09So I will be here.
12:10And if you don't get your question asked, I'm going to stay until the very end, and I will take
12:18every photo.
12:19I will answer every question.
12:20I'll shake every hand.
12:21I'll be the last person who leaves.
12:23I've got nowhere but the hotel to go.
12:25So we'll be here for a while.
12:26I think we've got our first question.
12:28And let me just tell you where the mics are.
12:30So Ceci has a mic.
12:31Where are the other mics?
12:32Right over there.
12:33Rob has one, and where's Velocity?
12:35Right here.
12:35Velocity has one, too.
12:36So just keep your hands up for us.
12:37Because those are your three mics.
12:38Exactly.
12:39Thank you all.
12:41Thelma Clarty, former DeSoto City Council member.
12:45Hey.
12:48I'm going to make this comment quick.
12:50First of all, I commend you.
12:51Thank you for coming to DeSoto.
12:53My question is, as a former lawyer with the U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, I am
13:03very disgusted with what's happening education-wide, civil rights-wide.
13:09And I would ask you to please, because the education department, black women, not only with the education department, and
13:17all the other federal agencies have been impacted the most.
13:21That's right.
13:22So I would ask you to have a platform to include how we can put these people back to work.
13:30Thank you, Councilwoman.
13:32And couldn't agree more.
13:35So a few things.
13:37We have seen hundreds of thousands of black women laid off because of this crazy doge process.
13:43And I don't want to call them public employees.
13:46I want to call them what they are, which is public servants.
13:49These are the folks who selflessly sign up to protect our communities, to protect our schools and our kids.
13:56And they deserve so much better than what they got from Elon Musk's crazy doge committee.
14:03And I am committing to you that when we win this seat, when we win a Senate majority, we will
14:08repeal these doge cuts.
14:09We will restore these public servants to their positions.
14:13And I just, let me just, let me explain real quick, because this is not just about someone's job.
14:18This is about all of us.
14:19Because some of you may have heard that a pest that we got rid of 60 years ago, the New
14:26World Screwworm, is now back in Texas infecting our livestock.
14:31It is threatening ranchers and farmers all over the state.
14:35We had an office in Uvalde, Texas, staffed with experts monitoring the spread of the New World Screwworm, preventing it
14:43from coming into this country.
14:45And then the richest man in the world thought it was a great idea to eliminate that office.
14:48And now, the New World Screwworm is back in Texas after 60 years.
14:53So this is not just about restoring people to their jobs, as important as that is.
14:57These jobs are critical.
14:59They protect us.
15:00They protect our economy.
15:01And it's why we need to do so much better by our public servants.
15:05So thank you for asking that question.
15:07You also mentioned education.
15:10So I, along with Representative Gina Hinojosa, our next governor, she's the best.
15:19I think our colleagues can agree Gina is the best.
15:22She and I sit next to each other on the floor of the house.
15:26We sit in the back row because we're the bad kids who cause all the problems.
15:30She and I led the fight against these private school voucher scams.
15:34And let me just, real quick, for those that don't know the history of this, the first
15:39voucher scam was introduced in Texas in 1957.
15:43And for the history buffs in the room, you know that was just a couple years after Brown
15:47v. Board of Education.
15:49That first voucher bill was a deliberate attempt to allow white parents to take their kids out
15:57of newly integrated public schools and send their kids to white-only private schools.
16:01These voucher scams have a dark, disturbing history.
