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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good Monday morning, everyone. One of the people who attended New York City Police Officer Jason Rivera's funeral on Friday was New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and she had something more to say that day than, "I'm sorry for your loss." The illegal firearm used to kill Rivera and Officer Wilbert Mora was trafficked from out of state. Gillibrand used the tragic occasion later that day, to push for a bill that maybe, just maybe, will get enough support to pass now, making illegal gun trafficking a federal crime. Hard to believe it isn't one already, we will ask, "Why not?"

Other things on the Senate's agenda. I know this sounds like a 2021 rerun, but negotiate with Joe Manchin for a slimmer version of the Build Back Better Bill. It could still matter to Democrats, don't forget, to their chances of keeping the majority in Congress, in particular, if they have something real to show on paid family leave, or universal pre-K, or some of the other central provisions. Senator Gillibrand was one of those people talking to Manchin late last year. We'll see where this picks up.

There's also Ukraine. Gillibrand is on the Armed Forces Committee with President Biden, talking about deploying troops to NATO countries nearby. We'll ask about that, and of course, it's the Senate that will have to confirm President Biden's pick to replace Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court. Biden has promised to nominate the court's first-ever Black woman from a list of many who are highly qualified. This may come as a shock, but at least one Republican is now promising to vote for at least one of those on Biden's shortlist. Federal judge Michelle Childs of South Carolina, some of you know she is a favorite of Congressman Jim Clyburn from South Carolina who's very close to Biden. With an apparent vote to confirm waiting to be had from South Carolina's Republican Senator Lindsey Graham.

Senator Graham: I can't think of a better person for President Biden to consider for the Supreme Court than Michelle Childs. She has wide support in our state. She's considered to be a fair-minded, highly gifted jurist. She's one of the most decent people I've ever met.

Brian Lehrer: Lindsey Graham on CBS Face the Nation yesterday. Surprised? With that, we welcome New York Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Hi, Senator, welcome back to WNYC.

Senator Gillibrand: Hello, how are you?

Brian Lehrer: Good. Thank you. Listeners, as some of you know, we call this Our Monthly Call Your Senator segment. Senator Gillibrand joins us once a month. If you live in New York, or even if you don't, your calls for Senator Gillibrand are welcome here on any of the issues that I mentioned in the intro, anything else related for her at 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692, or you can tweet a question for Senator Gillibrand @BrianLehrer. Let's start with the Supreme Court, Senator. Do you support President Biden's pledge to nominate a Black woman? Do you have a favorite from the names that are being discussed? Or maybe even another one to add to the conversation?

Senator Gillibrand: Well, thank you, Brian. I'm very excited about the list of judges that President Biden has floated so far. They are extremely well qualified. They have a diverse range of experience. I think it's really exciting for a lot of Americans to see this process move forward. I don't have a favorite. I've just begun to look at their credentials, and they all seem quite impressive to me. I'm looking forward to when we see who he nominates, and then the hearings, and then the vote.

Brian Lehrer: The clip of Senator Graham supporting Michelle Childs from his state, South Carolina, surprised?

Senator Gillibrand: Delightfully surprised. That's wonderful that he knows her, and that he knows her experience and the support she has throughout her state. I think her background is very, very compelling, and hopefully, she'll be considered along with the rest of them. I think it was a very favorable thing for Senator Graham to do, and it also moves the country towards more bipartisanship and a better working relationship. I was very pleased to hear it.

Brian Lehrer: It could be part home-state boosterism because Judge Michelle Childs is from his home state, or I guess we should note that Graham does show bursts of occasional bipartisanship, or at least deference to whoever is president on Supreme Court nominees. He did vote for Sonia Sotomayor, for example, which some other Republicans did not. Do you expect the contentious confirmation process necessarily? So often, when a woman of color is up for something substantial, Republicans tried to paint her as an angry radical.

Senator Gillibrand: I'm optimistic. Among the people that he's suggesting, one is a DC Circuit judge who already received three Republican votes in her circuit confirmation process. At least two, therefore, have some bipartisan support already. That, I think, bodes very well to a more substantive hearing as opposed to a political hearing.

Brian Lehrer: That's Ketanji Brown Jackson, the judge on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, who's considered a very leading candidate, who, yes did get some Republican votes when she was confirmed to that position. It would be politically difficult, we assume, for them to turn around and then vote no on a judge they voted yes on. Changing topics, we aired live on the show Mayor Eric Adams and Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell's eulogies on Friday morning for Officer Jason Rivera, and I see you were there at St. Patrick's Cathedral. We'll talk about the gun trafficking bill that you're interested in, but what was that whole experience like for you on Friday?

Senator Gillibrand: I thought it was one of the most moving sermons and ceremonies, and just public moments to lift up a life of someone who was extraordinarily brave and selfless. The diversity of the eulogies was really powerful. I thought the new Police Commissioner Sewell was extremely powerful. She had a quote where she said, "The NYPD will never give up this city," and the crowd erupted. Everyone in St. Patricks just stood to their feet because they had so much support for what she said. The way she memorialized this officer now detective, she gave him a detective grade.

Brian Lehrer: A posthumous promotion.

Senator Gillibrand: Posthumously, yes, which I thought was extremely thoughtful of her. The mayor gave a very beautiful eulogy as well, really trying to bind the city together, but the ones that really left everyone in tears were the ones from his brother, Geoffrey Rivera, and his wife, Dominique. They just were so heartfelt, and so thoughtful in how they talked about their brother and husband as this young man. I think he was only 22. How he always wanted to serve. He wanted to be a police officer from the time he was a little boy. That he always wanted to make his life about more than himself. I think the way people spoke about him, he just lit up a room every time he walked into it. I felt privileged that I was there to be able to commemorate his life and to have a Catholic mass in his honor. I thought it was very, very beautiful.

Brian Lehrer: There was a surprising political moment in his widow's eulogy, where she took a shot at the new Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg for having various progressive prosecutor positions. Did that surprise you? Do you agree with any of the criticism of DA Bragg?

Senator Gillibrand: It was at the end of her beautiful eulogy. It was definitely felt deeply with a lot of raw emotion, that she just wants her husband and all those who serve to be part of these citywide and statewide conversations. I think it was a real statement of her view that we have to support law enforcement when they are trying to enforce laws. I understand her perspective very clearly, so did everyone in that room. They stood up and they clapped and they cheered. There was just enormous support behind her when she said those words.

It is just to the larger debate that we're having as a society, what is public safety, and how do you ensure public safety for everyone? What is the right balance? I think that our team in the city with the mayor, and the DA, and the police commissioner, they will get this right. They will figure out exactly the right balance for how you protect public safety, how you empower those officers and detectives who are in charge of protecting people, but using other resources as well, making sure we're using social workers and mental health experts to ensure public safety and define public safety the most broadly, but there was not a dry eye in the room, and there was no one who left that service, not fully supportive of Detective Rivera and his family, and everyone else that was there to commemorate him and lift him up. I think this is a healing moment, not a dividing moment. I think what her words did was shine a bright light on how important it is that we get this right, and I think our mayor understands that and will work very well with the other elected leaders to get that done.

Brian Lehrer: Senator Kirsten Gillibrand with us on the legislation to make illegal gun trafficking across state lines to make it a federal crime, illegal gun trafficking. I guess I'm a little jaw dropped when I read your press release on that because illegal gun trafficking across state lines, isn't already a federal crime.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: That's pretty shocking, Brian. It's not right now our officers and FBI do not have the authority to do these cross-border investigations particularly-- Well, the FBI does, but the NYPD doesn't. Right now, somebody brings a gun into New York City that isn't properly registered, or wasn't bought properly, it's a paperwork violation. It's a misdemeanor, it's not a felony.

What we want to do is create a felony out of those who are the straw purchasers, who traffic these guns, bring them straight up the iron pipeline and sell them in the back of trucks, and just sell them directly to criminals, sell them directly to gang members. We know about different-- I talked to the Bronx DA, and she told me about a case where a college student was trafficking weapons by just putting them on the bus.

We've heard of other stories while they traffic weapons through Amtrak. The ease with which these criminals are bringing in firearms that are then used in crimes is shocking. We have this proposal that would basically criminalize this activity. A gun trafficker could face up to 20 years in prison, and up to $250,000 fine. It makes this entire process illegal that you can't receive two or more firearms and bring them across state line if the recipient knows or has reason to know that the receipt is illegal, that's the core of this bill.

It can really take on the organizers and the trafficking rings, and they, the kingpins can get up to 25 years in prison, or 35 years if they're trafficking machine guns or if the gun has a firearm silencer or muffler. This is the way to put teeth into law enforcement's toolbox, so they can go out and find these traffic rings and find these smugglers. It'll make a difference and keep our city safer. 90% of the guns used in crime in New York City are from out of state, and so we know if you could stop this, you can save lives, particularly the innocent young people who bullets are killing, just a stray bullet.

One of the reasons why we named this bill, the Hadiya Pendleton and Nyasia Pryear-Yard Bill is after two young girls who lost their lives in that way. Hadiya Pendleton is from Chicago, Nyasia Pryear-Yard was a young woman living in Brooklyn. I sat down with her mother last week just to talk about this bill and what we want to do to bring it forward. I met with a bunch of the moms who are part of the mom's movement to have lost--

I met another mom who lost two sons. This is so constant, and when you meet a mom who's lost a four-year-old boy on a Park bench when she's sitting there, just spending time with her child, you can't recover from those moments. These moms are carrying the message of their children and their loved ones and lifting them up for us to remember that we deserve safety in our communities, we deserve to not have this random gun violence constantly plaguing every neighborhood, and it's something that I think this bill would help begin to protect our communities.

Brian: You say it would make a difference. Would it make a difference? Skeptics might argue if illegal gun trafficking into New York is already a state crime, making it illegal under federal law too won't matter much to the availability of illegal guns, because they're already flouting the law in that respect, so is it more than symbolic?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: It's much more than symbolic because if you just arrest an individual who shot a gun and someone died, you just can maybe convict him of using a illegal firearm, but what's happening is there are these criminal networks and gangs and trafficking rings that are bringing up hundreds of guns purposefully so it's easier for a criminal to buy a gun in New York, despite all our strong gun safety rules. We have background checks. We have lots of strong rules, but this trafficking subverts all of them. There's no opportunity for a background check if you're just having a criminal sell a gun to another criminal.

If they're just pouring into the state through the iron pipeline, you need to go after the kingpins. You need to go after the people that are taking these guns from the 1% of bad gun dealers out there that just know that this is going straight up to New York, straight into criminal markets. They have to be put in jail too, and so that's why this is necessary because NYPD doesn't have the authority to cross state lines. They can't do the investigation and find out who brought the guns. Then this gives more tools to them and to the FBI to really crack down and put these kingpins in jail.

Brian Lehrer: I'm curious if you know you have Police Union support for meaningful gun legislation. We have a tweet from a listener reacting to you saying after police commissioner, Keechant Sewell said, "We will never give up this city to crime," or whatever these exact words were, you said, "And the crowd erupted," this listener writes, it was cops. This funeral was a staged political event aimed at smashing the police reform movement. It certainly wasn't only cops, but it was largely cops in that audience.

Do you have a sense if the Police Union support for "taking back the city," and obviously they would support their two brothers who were murdered in cold blood, but do they support meaningful gun legislation? Because Republicans tend to support Police Unions when it comes to denouncing criminal justice reform to reduce mass incarceration as dangerous to the police, but do they also get behind gun control to reduce the risk of officers in their union getting shot? Police Union support might really matter after a double cop murder like this if it was focused also on gun legislation.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: In the past, they have, and when I first wrote this bill, I wrote it with police commissioner Kelly with his help, and I just sat down with Bronx DA Darcel Clark, and she said she would love this to be a law because it would help her get the kingpins that are bringing-- She actually arrested and prosecuted this one trafficker who was bringing hundreds of weapons into New York City through the bus system.

In the past, this has been supported by law enforcement. When we reintroduce it, we will be asking-- I've asked for a meeting with our new police commissioner Sewell as well, and so I'll get her thoughts on it as well, but we will ask for the support of the police organizations because this gives them tools. This was a bill that was always designed to be supported by everyone, and it's why the last time we had a vote on it, we did get 58 votes. We were very close to the 60 we needed. It was really just a political misstep that it didn't get to 60, and I think that we can hopefully earn this larger bipartisan coalition to get this bill passed this year, but I suspect we will have full support of Police Advocacy Organizations as well as our individual DAs and commissioners.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call on the coming Supreme court nomination, Paula in Manhattan. You're on WNYC with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Hi, Paula.

Paula: Hello. Thank you. Can I make a quick comment on both issues, the court and the police? I've been doing appeals for the PBA for the last 20 years, so I'll know a little bit about the police. It's been my business. I'm the only one that done it in the city.

Brian Lehrer: When you say appeals, you mean fundraising for the Police Union?

Paula: No, I've done the actual appeals from the Supreme Court to the appellate divisions.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, on what kinds of cases?

Paula: Whenever there were any kind of penalties to being terminated to rookies being on probation, the whole thing.

Brian Lehrer: I see, so you represented the-- [crosstalk] Go ahead.

Paula: Pardon me?

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead. Including the most what?

Paula: No, it's just my business, an independent business. The most recent case I did was actually the [unintelligible 00:19:57] case before I retired two years ago.

Brian Lehrer: You're a lawyer who's represented the police [inaudible 00:20:04]

Paula: No, I'm not a lawyer at all. I'm just a person-- Just taught myself how to do appeals. It's an administrative job. You don't have to be a lawyer.

Brian Lehrer: All right. What did you want to say about that issue?

Paula: I just wanted to say that I just hate to see anybody impugning our new DA's progressive attempt. He's got an uphill battle for sure. I've lived in New York for 60 years. The PBA is just so out of control. That's my comment. He needs all the help he can get. I hope the mayor is up to it, and our new police commissioner [inaudible 00:20:51]. What I wanted to say about the Supreme court thing, if I might have a moment more or not.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, go ahead.

Paula: Just questioning whether Justice Thomas could also be considered a token judge, or judge installed because of affirmative action. Whether Senator Wicker could be considered to have been given his job by virtue of white supremacy.

Brian Lehrer: Well, thank you very much, that's it. She refers to Senator Wicker and listeners I'll give you a little background on what I think she's referring to. Roger Wicker, Republican Senator from Mississippi denounced president Biden's announced intention to nominate a black woman. I have this Wicker quote here. It says, "The irony is that the Supreme court is at the very same time hearing cases about this sort of affirmative racial discrimination," referring to the affirmative action lawsuit against Harvard and UNC, "while adding someone who is the beneficiary of this sort of quota," said Senator Wicker. Do you want to respond to that, or to the caller, Senator Gillibrand?

Senator Gillibrand: Well, I disagree very strongly with Senator Wicker. I do not believe that that is at all the case. I think that what president Biden has done is very wise and thoughtful and necessary and important. I think these judges, just looking at their resumes and their accomplishments are more than qualified, and are the kind of people we want on the Supreme court because of their breadth and depth of experience.

I'm very optimistic that the hearings will be very positive. I think those comments, they will be isolated in nature and I think they perhaps were even misspoken. I hope that we can have some common ground on this nominee, because obviously we've had many presidents, including Reagan and Trump who have designated wanting to nominate a certain demographic, such as, "I want to have a woman justice." That is fine and acceptable. I don't think we need to have confusion there.

Brian Lehrer: We'll continue in a minute with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and more of your calls, stay with us.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer, WNYC with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat from New York of course, who joins us once a month for a Call Your Senator segment. We'll get to more of your calls in a minute. I see you were at Bellevue hospital in Queens last week to help launch a new program funded by President Biden's COVID relief bill from last year, the American Rescue Plan, it's the New York City Public Health Corps. What does that mean?

Senator Gillibrand: This was a wonderful opportunity to see some of the really remarkable things that have happened because of COVID. We've seen because of COVID our healthcare system be pressed to the absolute limits, doctors, nurses, EMTs hospital personnel, working overtime, never getting breaks, having enormous challenges. One of the solutions to the overburdening of our healthcare system is to make sure we are creating new recruits, to make sure we're building the next generation of healthcare workers.

One of the ideas I had during our negotiations on COVID relief was creating a national health force, creating hundreds of thousands of entry-level healthcare workers who, if inspired, would become tomorrow's nurses, doctors, EMTs, and healthcare professionals. New York City, being great at many things, were the only ones to actually put this into place immediately. It was because they were already working on it when I was writing the legislation and knew about it.

We were able to meet with the New York City Public Health Corps who had been working with H&H for a while and really getting them up and running over the last year. They were the ones who applied for resources, and they got 25 million to implement their program. They've already trained about 500 young workers in healthcare. These are community healthcare workers. Let me describe what that is. These are young people, or sometimes even mid-career people who switched over to do this. They become the eyes and ears in a community for doctors, nurses, and EMTs.

They're the ones who will work with a community to go into a senior's home and make sure they're taking their medication, make sure there's actually food in the pantry, make sure their heat's on. If you need eyes and ears to see how is the community doing and what support do they need, one of the doctors who testified said, "I can give the best prescription and the best healthcare in the world, but I don't know if it's being followed through, I don't know what's happening in that individual's home, but that's what this community health force does."

They can be in the community meeting the needs, making sure that people are getting resources through food stamps, through different food banks, making sure they're getting resources for heat, for their homes, making sure they're actually filling their prescriptions. The inspiration of these young people was so incredible because they are literally saving lives by just being present, and being the extension of our healthcare system right into the community.

This was very exciting. It was win-win, it was seeing what federal money actually can do. This is a jobs program. This is 500 young people and mid-career people who are earning salaries of $40,000 to $50,000 a year, which is more than an entry-level job. If they do love healthcare, it might inspire them to then go on and take a course to become nurses or a course to become doctors. This is tomorrow's healthcare professionals. It really mattered. I was there to talk about pushing this program in the rest of the country. I sent a letter to the CDC last year, urging them implementing this more broadly. Then this was the day I was announcing a second letter saying that I want $55 billion included in this year's fiscal year '23 budget request by the president for more health force activities.

Brian Lehrer: Mark in White Plains. You're on WNYC. Hi, Mark.

Mark: Good morning. Thank you very much for having me. I know that you're on the Armed Services Committee, Senator, and to that end, I ask this. So often, we think that it is the munitions industry, the aerospace industry that encourages our Congress folks to keep these crazy wars going on and on. You being in such a position [inaudible 00:28:10] particularly as we look at Ukraine, a neighboring country to Russia, we here in our hemisphere, when the Cuban thing happened, we didn't want these folks in our backyard or Venezuela. We wouldn't accept that. What justifications do you see for the Congress, for the government as a whole, to keep building up these military budgets?

Brian Lehrer: Mark. Thank you very much. Our military budget, Senator, and also on the troop deployment to NATO countries nearest to Russia.

Senator Gillibrand: I appreciate the caller's perspective because we've heard this over many, many years, like beware of the military-industrial complex, beware of outsider institutions trying to get Congress to spend more and more money on war funding to increase the likelihood of war. The good news is there's many of us in Congress who are working on war powers reform, making sure wars can only be declared through Congress, not through executive action, to make sure that when we do have to be in that position, we know what our exit strategy is, we know who we're fighting, in what country, for what length of time, so we don't get into these forever wars ever again.

I think that was why for president Biden, it was one of his priorities that it was time to draw down our presence in Afghanistan and to end that war. With regard to the specific question of Ukraine, there is a huge push in Congress right now to solve this diplomatically. There is not the support to rush to another war or to engage in military action if it is not absolutely necessary, and there's a long way to go before this would be absolutely necessary. That means we should be working on a multilateral basis with our allies right now to talk about sanctions, to talk about other pressure on Russia, to make sure they do not invade Ukraine and continue to destabilize the region.

There is a lot of support in the Senate to make sure that we have a robust sanctions bill ready. There's several of us have already supported a bill by Senator Menendez to have those sanctions ready should Russia make a move that is contrary to peace in that region. We are not eager to engage another war, or in unnecessary military action. It doesn't mean we don't stand ready to protect this country, to protect our values, and to protect our allies, should it be necessary.

Right now there is not a call to war. I can assure you within the Congress, it is a call to aggressive diplomacy and using sanctions and other tools that we have to create a peaceful resolution. I do understand the caller's perspective, and about what pressures Congress might be under at any given time, but right now there is a lot of support for alternative efforts against Russia.

Brian Lehrer: Tyson in the Bronx. You're on WNYC with Senator Gillibrand. Hello, Tyson.

Tyson: Hello, Brian. How are you?

Brian Lehrer: I'm okay, Thank you. You have a question for the Senator?

Tyson: Yes. I'm really upset that the Democrats aren't strong-arming Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema to get with the program because too many have fought and died for voting rights in this country, and for them to be prima donnas and continue to grab unwanted spotlight is just unacceptable. I also would like to see Anita Hill put forward as a Supreme court Nominee.

Brian Lehrer: Tyson, thank you very much. On voting rights, Senator, we know the filibuster seems like it will remain for voting rights legislation because of Manchin and Sinema, but as recently as 2006, the Senate voted 98 to nothing to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act, including the justice department oversight of many Southern that had histories of racist voter suppression, and some of the states appear to be added again, but this time you would get zero Republican votes for the Voting Rights Bill apparently, and two fewer Democrats than you need, Manchin and Sinema, for overturning the filibuster to go ahead on this with just 51. What do you want to say to the caller or anyone on this?

Senator Gillibrand: Well, I want to thank the caller for his advocacy and interest. It was very disappointing, we all were hoping we could get to a place where we could have a common ground on using this filibuster reform to include a vote on the Voting Rights Act, and the specific bills that Senator Manchin negotiated that were most of the John Lewis bill, not all of it, but most of it.

We didn't get there, and that's just the realities of electoral politics. We only have 50 Democrats, they don't all have the same views on all issues, and we weren't able to win them over on the merits of filibuster reform for this vote. It doesn't mean the issue's dead, it doesn't mean we won't get to vote on it again, it doesn't mean it's not going to come up next year or the year after.

It just means this one effort we were unable to move forward. I do believe that voting rights is essential, what's happening in these Republican red states where they have very Republican and very conservative governors and legislatures, they are upending people's rights to vote, they are making it harder for people of color to vote, they are making different demographics harder to vote in a place like New Hampshire, they don't want the students to vote.

There's so many efforts to unwind people's rights to vote, and it would have been better if we could have protected them in this moment in time, but we could not. It's not about going after any individual members of the Senate, we are all colleagues and we respect one another. It would not be effective, what's effective is to continue to advocate on the merits and winning larger majorities so that you could have more diversity view and still be successful in getting a vote.

The Democratic party keeps the majority because it has a diversity of views. You have to be able to elect Democrats in very red and very purple places, and they're not always going to share all the views of a New Yorker, which is understandable. We have a very progressive view of the world, and we have a certain view about what our elected leaders should do, and that's not going to be the same in other States. I know you're disappointed, I'm deeply disappointed, but it doesn't mean we're not going to stop fighting. We're never going to give up, we're going to keep pushing forward and we will get another vote at some point in time, and by then maybe we will have been more persuasive.

Don't lose hope. I think the next focus that we're going to have is trying to build the coalition for the Build Back Better legislation. I think we'll get there. I think there's a lot in this bill that Senator Manchin supports. He definitely supports parts of affordable daycare, he supports universal pre-K, he supports green energy investments, energy efficiency investments. He supports affordable housing, he supports lower drug prices. These are the areas where we're trying to create relief for the economy for individual families to lower the costs of housing and daycare, and drugs and medicine. These are shared goals and values, and we were very close to getting to yes, a month ago. We just need to go back to where we were in common ground build from there and get it done, and I believe that will happen.

When we do that, then we can continue to talk to the American public about how we are going to help continue to help the economy grow through these very meaningful reforms, along with all the infrastructure investments. We will get this economy up and running. People will be working, they'll have access to better healthcare, and they'll have access to stronger jobs and better income. That's what we're working on, and I do have faith and don't lose faith. Everyone is different, they have different priorities, but it doesn't mean we can't have common round.

Brian Lehrer: Senator Gillibrand, our monthly call your Senator segment. We always appreciate it. Senator, talk to you next month.

Senator Gillibrand: Thanks, Brian.

 

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