Today, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries appeared on MS NOW’s The Last Word, where he made clear that Donald Trump and sycophantic Republicans failed the American people with their reckless and unpopular war of choice, which is why Democrats successfully passed a War Powers Resolution to hold them accountable and remain committed to driving down the high cost of living.

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: Leading off our discussion tonight is House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Mr. Leader, thank you very much for joining us tonight. I want to begin with your reaction to this breaking news of Todd Blanche, Donald Trump’s criminal defense lawyer, now being likely offered for Senate confirmation to the permanent role of Attorney General.

LEADER JEFFRIES: Good evening, Lawrence. Great to be with you. Todd Blanche is not qualified to be the Deputy Attorney General, the Acting Attorney General and he certainly is not qualified to be the United States Attorney General. The role of that particular position is to serve as the people’s lawyer. Todd Blanche has been acting like Donald Trump’s lawyer, which was his former position. But he has failed to transition in terms of behaving in the best interest of the American people. And we know this based on example after example, most recently his decision to help initiate the corrupt $1.8 billion slush fund, which they’ve only backed away from temporarily because of intense public pressure.

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: I want to get your reaction to what you see in the congressional map as of last night. I know this is difficult because California is still counting votes, but there was a redistricting in California specifically designed by the Democrats to deliver more Democrats from California to the House of Representatives. How is that looking as of today, if you can tell anything about it? And what about the rest of the map nationally?

LEADER JEFFRIES: When it’s all said and done, we believe we’ll pick up an additional five seats in California. And in Texas, by way of example, the Republicans who claim that they’re going to pick up five seats will be fortunate if they gain two or three. So we’ll net more out of California than they’ll net out of Texas. And then when we go state after state after state, despite the Republican efforts to try to gerrymander the national congressional map as part of their toxic scheme to rig the midterm elections, they’re going to be unsuccessful. They will not get four seats out of Florida. They will fall far short of that. And of course, Democrats stand poised to pick up seats all across the country because Donald Trump and the Republican majority in Congress has been a failure. Costs haven’t gone down. Costs have gone up. Life has gotten more expensive. Republicans have gotten us into this reckless and costly war of choice over in the Middle East when Donald Trump promised to stop wars, not start them. And I think the American people increasingly recognize that, if they want a Congress that actually is designed to make life better for the American people, you’ve got to put Democrats in charge. We will actually focus on driving down the high cost of living and fixing our broken healthcare system.

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: You know, I sat on this program when I saw Speaker Johnson put the House in a recess because he didn’t think he had enough votes to defend against the War Powers Resolution that you were forcing a vote on in the House. I said at the time, if you put them into recess, when they come back, you’re going to have fewer votes. That’s what happens when House Members go home to districts, facing something very unpopular like Donald Trump’s war. It’s not—it didn’t seem to me there was any chance of Republicans coming back with more votes to support Donald Trump’s war, and that’s what we saw today.

LEADER JEFFRIES: That’s absolutely right. This is an example of justice delayed not being justice denied. We’re thankful for the leadership of the once and future Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Greg Meeks, and all of the Members of the House Democratic Caucus who pushed this forward. The American people have turned against this war from the very beginning. It’s deeply unpopular. The war has actually made life more expensive for the American people. Gas prices are through the roof. This is already on top of a failing Trump-Republican economy and the Trump tariffs, which have caused prices to increase by thousands of dollars per year for everyday Americans. And as of the moment, Iran is in a stronger position than they were prior to the war being started, particularly because they have control of the Strait of Hormuz. And so, what we need at this moment is for Senate Republicans to do the right thing—now that the House has acted decisively—reclaim our authority as the only branch of government with the power to declare war. That hasn’t happened. We need to end this and end this now. And Republicans in the Senate can do the right thing by the American people over the next few days. And we’re hopeful that they’ll do just that.

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, thank you very much for starting off our coverage tonight.

LEADER JEFFRIES: Thank you.

Full interview can be watched here.

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