Random Length News - “You have to be willing to put yourself in harm’s way”: Congressman Robert Garcia on resisting Trump

Organizers of the Black History Month event in Long Beach had been asked not to pre-announce Congressman Robert Garcia’s appearance — because of threats against him.

That’s what happens in today’s America when you’re a highly visible and vocal opponent of Donald Trump. The federal government itself has even gotten in on the threats (however thinly veiled), targeting Garcia as part of “Operation Whirlwind,” a supposed investigation into threats against public officials, after Garcia told CNN that he felt Elon Musk was “harming the American public in an enormous way” and that “the American public want us to bring actual weapons to this bar fight, […] an actual fight for democracy.”

One of the weapons Garcia has wielded in that fight is his position as ranking Democrat on the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. And if the Dems manage to take the House of Representatives in November, Garcia is likely to chair that committee, which would mean a lot more firepower at his disposal — and with it, undoubtedly, more threats.

But Garcia knows that’s part of the job right now — though it’s certainly not what he envisioned.

RANDOM LENGTHS NEWS: When did you first think about running for the House?

GARCIA: [During] my last year as mayor, [then-Congressman Alan Lowenthal] said, “There’s a possibility that I will not run for re-election.” When he mentioned that to me, I began to think about it as a real option. […] I had 13 years total as mayor and on the city council. You’ve got to have new ideas and new people; I think that’s important. It felt like the House would be a good place to bring my values, and I felt the country was at such a crossroads. We had survived the first Trump administration, and there was so much going on around issues of affordability and immigration, so it just felt like the right decision.

Did you imagine that Trump might be re-elected, or did you think, “There’s no way we’ll do that again?”

I knew it was always a possibility, but honestly, I thought there was no way we would re-elect this man. I mean, we had already seen it once — how could we vote for him again?! […] A lot of folks realize this second term is even more horrific than the first — and, unfortunately, more effective for him and the extreme parts of his base.

You’re doing a lot of different things in office, but a significant percentage of your energy is going toward resisting Trump — you’re out front doing that — which is obviously not what you expected you’d be doing when you went into the House.

That’s right. I went in thinking I was going to spend my first few years really focused on transportation and infrastructure issues. I had requested to be on [that] committee. That was really what I was focused on: “How can I support some good government measures? How can I support bringing back federal dollars to the cities and communities I represent?” But obviously, things changed so fast.

How disappointing is Trump’s presidency for you personally — not just in terms of the country, that we’re doing [a Trump presidency] again and what’s being done to the republic — but in terms of your lived experience in Congress? Because [resisting Trump] is not what you wanted to do.

Obviously I’m very disappointed in our country that we re-elected Donald Trump. That was a really hard moment, I think, for all of us. But then I just didn’t really dwell on it — I just moved on. It became more of: “We have to fight back. We have to be aggressive and tough, and we have to stop and slow the [Trump] agenda as much as possible.” I immediately understood the stakes […] and was urging everyone to understand how serious this challenge would be and that we couldn’t just do things the way we’ve always done them.

What sort of threats have you received from Trump supporters?

I’ve been receiving a lot of threats — death threats. I had a guy show up to my office in D.C. who threatened to slit my throat [and] got arrested. I’ve had people call the office who’ve been investigated by Capitol police and the authorities . . . It’s pretty common. I think one of the unfortunate parts of all this is that the louder and stronger and bolder one is against fascism, the more threats you’re going to get. I also think (and I told this to my team) that that’s not a reason not to be loud. There are only 435 members of the House. The Constitution is very clear about who is supposed to check the president — and right now the courts aren’t always doing it. So what else do we have? You have to be willing to put yourself in harm’s way, if necessary — and if you’re not willing to do that, I think you have to reconsider whether Congress is the right job for you at this time.

In a documentary I saw about Winston Churchill, there’s a bit where they say that, although, of course, by no stretch of the imagination was Churchill glad that Hitler and World War II came about, he was gratified to be in a position to take on that challenge. Do you have any of that sort of feeling?

I don’t know what I’ve thought about that. What I have thought about is that I am glad that right now there are folks being elected to Congress that are fighters and younger and come from working-class backgrounds, because I think that we understand the danger and come from communities that are the most harmed by Donald Trump. The fact that I’m an immigrant and gay and come from a working-class background gives me a [particular] perspective on these fights. […] You get to Congress, and you realize that there are a lot of millionaires here who may not see that the impacts [of government action] directly affect their families every time. I’m grateful that I can use my voice and my experience in the fight. I think it’s important, and I think there needs to be more folks who are engaged in this type of experience.

There are a lot of people in Congress who, in some sense, might not know better when it comes to their support of Trump’s agenda. But I think there’s a particular evil in people like Mitch McConnell, for example, who, whatever their genuine beliefs, do know better morally and ethically, yet go along with Trump regardless of what he does to further their own ambition or power-grab or whatever. It’s hard for me to imagine what it’s like to have to work with these people who you know know better and yet are selling out the republic.

Yeah, that’s very hard. […] There are folks in Congress who are genuinely just really bad people. They’re harmful, they’re selfish, they’re not there to help others, and it’s a real shame. There are folks in Congress who are genuinely homophobic and xenophobic and don’t think that folks like me should have rights — [or] even be in Congress because I’m an immigrant. They’ve been very public about that. Then there are those folks who are smart and have experience working with all sorts of folks but are basically putting on an act because they know that Donald Trump controls their party. And I think that is a real disservice to the country and a shame. And it’s hard because some of them will even admit to you, “Well, I don’t agree with this, but I have to do it” — but these actions are destroying our democracy and our country! I have no patience for that. Oftentimes, people will say, “Well, we should be focused on bipartisan solutions,” but I’m like, “It’s not the time for that right now.” Right now is not the time to kum ba yah with the folks that are destroying our institutions and our democracy. The country’s on the line; this is not just another moment in time. It’s a slow boil. Donald Trump is so effectively enacting decades of planning by some of the most extreme forces that want a very different form of government in our country. That’s something we have to take very seriously.

What do you think the Democrats haven’t done in the past or aren’t doing right now to better resist?

We should be able to be critical of our own party and the mistakes. Coming into Congress, it was very clear to me that Democrats were not fighting hard enough, that there needed to be change, that we needed to uplift younger people, and I think we need to be honest about that the fact that the Democratic Party has failed the country in being active in aggressively pushing back against Trump and the destruction of our agencies and our government. We have to be honest about that. It’s one of the reasons I challenged the seniority system. I mean, I’m a sophomore [in the House]. There hadn’t been a [Democratic] sophomore elected [as ranking member] on a committee in 102 years. We need to throw out the seniority system [mandating] when you’re next in line you get the job regardless of your ideas. That’s wrong. When I ran to [be the ranking member on] Oversight, people were like, “You can’t do that, because the person who is the most senior is going to get it — that’s the way we do things around here.” But I don’t play like that. More Democrats need to challenge the way things have always been done — because it doesn’t work anymore.

I’m sure you’ve read or at least been well-briefed on the Democratic National Committee’s 2024 election autopsy. One of the things it says in there is that the Democratic Party is too focused on “identity politics” — that the Party should “focus less on abstract issues and identity politics, and connect with voters on the issues they say matter most.” My great philosophical hero, Richard Rorty, diagnosed this problem in the ‘90s, saying that whereas at one time the progressive left was expending all its energy on programs and policies to make life better for non-elites and the oppressed, starting in the late ‘60s there was a shift in focus from action to talk, with Left “collaborat[ing] with the Right in making cultural issues central to public debate” [Achieving Our Country (1998), p. 14]. And it’s increased exponentially since then. I’d like to hear you address that.

I think the criticism is more broad. I actually think recognizing issues around representation [and] racial justice should be part of political dialogue and the way we frame issues because of the injustice, especially that Black Americans have faced and certainly other communities and immigrants. However, what has not been central to our argument that has to be is class solidarity and class politics. That argument has been so absent […]. One thing that all these communities share is […] coming from the working class and being underserved and under-resourced. I think what’s happening now — and it’s continued to grow — is people understanding that there is a coalition that needs to be strengthened that unites working-class people. That includes working-class White communities, folks that are being continuously ripped off by the very, very rich, the billionaires and large corporations that have so much control over our government. That matters, and I think that’s where the Party needs to grow, to reflect on and to adjust.

As you said to Politico in February, “Trump commits an impeachable offense every week” — and yet you say that when you come home to Long Beach, you get asked about the Epstein files more than almost anything else. You’ve been out front using that tool as a wedge issue against Trump and his minions. Why do you think this is the issue that’s galvanized the most general pushback?

I think it’s a couple of different things. One is that it has really resonated with women — [not just] young women, but women all across the spectrum — because what it really is is a failure of government to protect women when they have been brutally raped, abused, trafficked . . . When they go to the government to ask for help, the government turns its back and instead chose to protect those that did the abuse. And that speaks to people across this country. When your sister or daughter goes and talks to law enforcement about abuse, they should be heard, and the government should respond. In addition to that, the broader Epstein investigation is also about this class of people that can get away with anything. This same group of people that have abused and trafficked women […] can [also] get away with stealing all your hard-earned tax dollars and getting huge tax breaks — and they’re [suffering] no consequences, but instead getting protection from the government. What we’re seeing is that the very rich and the very powerful in this country can get away with anything, including doing the most heinous, horrific things to children. That speaks to why people care so much about this investigation.

Aside from voting, what would you like to see average Americans doing that can make a difference?

Look, the fact that [California] passed Proposition 50, while a lot of the country was slow-walking this [sort of resistance], is such a testament to us. That was a huge deal. […] We’re also a state that spends a lot to help candidates and causes across the country. I’ve been inspired by the way so many communities have come together to support the programs for undocumented people just to protect them, whether it’s been putting together whistle packets, mutual-aid programs, food drives, rapid-response programs, watching out for ICE or DHS officers. […] The protests, the active, supportive communities, the mutual aid — all of that stuff actually works. We’ve seen it in action. […] Even things as simple as putting together care packages or being parts of rapid-response teams — that’s about resisting and slowing this administration and their harms. The actions of those people helping communities, especially those that are in need because of what Trump’s doing, to me that’s the most powerful thing that people can do right now. We have two-plus years left of Donald Trump, and we have to slow and stop his agenda as much as possible. Part of that is supporting the people he’s harming. That’s really critical. Politically, getting involved in campaigns, supporting candidates you believe in — all this stuff really matters. We’re seeing that across the country, where progressives and Democrats are winning elections. That’s something that people can really have an impact on.