Today, DNC Chair Jaime Harrison, DCCC Chair Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, and DGA Chair Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham held a joint press call to discuss how Democrats will protect incumbents and beat and replace extremist Republicans in the midterm elections. This call came on the heels of California Governor Newsom’s landslide victory last night, which reaffirmed voters’ support for President Biden’s and Democrats’ leadership in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic.

During the call, the Chairs discussed Republicans’ record of recklessly promoting vaccine misinformation while President Biden and Democrats’ agenda has added over 4.6 million new jobs since January, brought unemployment claims to the lowest levels since the start of the pandemic, and delivered a historic tax cut to working families. As the Chairs noted, Republicans’ failure to lead on tackling the pandemic, attacks on Americans’ reproductive rights, and their deadly and divisive rhetoric that fueled the deadly insurrection on January 6th are all on the ballot heading into the midterm elections. 

See below for an excerpt of DNC Chair Jaime Harrison’s remarks on the call:

“Elected officials can talk all they want, but it’s really about showing up and doing the work. And what we know is this — this message is very simple and it’s very clear. Two words: Democrats deliver. And we have proven that for the past 8 months. The American Rescue Plan got shots in arms, put checks in pockets, and we invested vital money into our small businesses and into our local municipalities. We expanded the child tax credit which has already kept three million kids out of poverty.

“…Now I wish I could tell you Republicans were working side by side with us on all of this stuff. But they don’t seem to have any interest in getting any results. And we saw that in California. While Democrats deliver, Republicans obstruct, they divide, and they deceive the American people. 

“I wish I could tell you in the House that Kevin McCarthy was rolling up his sleeves and getting to work with us to grow the economy and invest in our infrastructure. But he’s too busy catering to insurrectionists in his own caucus. I wish I could tell you Republicans were serious about beating back this pandemic, but more and more they’re starting to seem like they’re anti-vaxxers. I wish the passion they had for horse de-wormer and hydroxychloroquine, they would have for this vaccine and getting people vaccinated in this country, but they don’t have that same type of passion because all they care about is politics. All they care about is trying to get back to power. But what Joe Biden and Democrats across the country, in the House, the Senate, our governors, and in our legislatures — what they are demonstrating is that they don’t give a damn about the polls or the politics — what they care about is the health and safety of the American people.”