Rep. Maxwell Frost

Yeah.

Thanks for having me on.

Well, you know, I think and something I've been talking a lot about is the fact that we need an affirmative agenda.

Right.

It's not enough just to run against something.

And this is something that I believed in far before I became an elected official.

Right.

As an organizer, this is something that you focus on, not giving people something to vote against, but something to vote for.

And the fact of the matter is we're.

We're at a point in time in our country where people are very desperate.

Wealth inequality is at its worst, which means that for working people are being siphoned out of the middle class and being put into what I call the working poor more and more and more.

And what this is doing is it's creating a desperation in our people where they will suspend their values and beliefs on a lot of different issues.

Because the thing right in front of them, taking care of their family, being able to have health care and housing and food and all these things is at risk.

And this is part of the reason why we saw so many people who typically might vote for a Democrat or typically, you know, if you were to ask them, are you conservative?

They'd say no.

That's why a lot of them ended up voting for Trump or not voting at all.

And it's something that we see.

You know, we were talking about before about South America.

I was in El Salvador earlier this year on the Kilmar-Abrego-Garcia case.

I got to speak with a lot of people from civil society about this is a country where, what did that president win by, 80% or 90%?

I mean, something ridiculous.

But 80% or 90% of the country doesn't agree with him on all the issues or wouldn't even align with him.

But it's that it got so bad in terms of safety.

that people suspended their beliefs on a lot of other things to handle the one situation.

That's how people like Trump get elected.

Fascists and authoritarians don't come to power when everyone's doing good, when everybody has health care, when everyone has enough resources for the family.

It happens in times of desperation.

And what we have to do as a party is we have to understand that not in terms of just how we talk about the issues.

It's not just about identifying the right issues, but it's about providing big,

bold transformational solutions that people see themselves represented in like, Oh, that thing would change my life would like make it way easier for me to live in this country.

And, and that's what I think we really need to get with the program on.

No one's interested in like this one bill that would fix some things for some people around the edges.

If you're within this income bracket and you'll get it in four to eight years, like,

It doesn't work.

It's not a winner politically.

And it's honestly not good policy, especially in a political system like ours, where in four years, the next person can undo the whole thing and you never see that policy come to fruition.

And it's like this thing that happens over and over again.

And I guess what I'm talking about broadly is the fact that the kind of neoliberal policies, I think we're going to have to put that aside and take a step back and look at big, bold transformational change.

And I think in one way,

Trump is really showing us the potholes in this system that we have.

And the question is whether or not we, when we're back in power and even now, do we fill them?

And I think that's the biggest test for our party right now.

Do we run on it, win on it, and then most importantly, do it?

Because you get a lot of people who say the Democrats only have a communication problem.

I think that's part of it.

But that would mean, well, we do everything right, but not enough people know about it.

I think there's a doing problem as well in terms of what we run on and what we do.

So there's a few things there, but I'm actually pretty optimistic in this moment.

I think for the first time in my lifetime, there is no democratic establishment right now.

Some people might disagree with me when they hear that, but an establishment is when all the top power brokers are doing the same thing.

There's so much...

feud and all this stuff in the last election that there is no establishment.

It is up for grabs.

So I think we hear from the base and the people that they want that kind of change.

And that's why I'm a little optimistic, even in this dark time that this party can change and do what it needs to do.

It's the ideas and it's also what we do when we have power.

Of course, under four years of Joe Biden, there was a lot of really good bills passed.

But part of the problem is the most transformational parts of those pieces of legislation.

I traveled the country for Kamala Harris, right?

I would go speak with people and they would say, I don't feel it.

And it's a couple of things.

The biggest thing is we have such wealth inequality in this country, the fact that so many little people have so much and so many people have nothing, that the economy is rigged like this.

And the thing is that when the economy is rigged like this, even when you pass bills that grow the economy, which on paper is good,

it grows the way it's rigged.

And so when it grows like that, people at the bottom, which is the majority of it's all working people, they don't feel that as much.

And that's part of the issue that we have and part of the reason why we need to take a step back and look at the system itself and how we change that

for people so that way we all feel it.

And I think, and I agree with you, it's, it's the policy, it's the way we talk about it.

And then it's what we do when we're in power.

And part of the thing that I've been talking to a lot of folks about is how do we write legislation in Congress to set more aggressive timelines?

This is something FDR was obsessed with throughout the new deal, right?

Is,

you know, for every two things or whatever that would take four years.

Like, we need something people will feel in a couple months to show people that government can work for them.

We don't have that kind of thinking anymore in government.

The timelines are so vast, they spill into other presidencies when you don't know what the political situation is going to be.

And the fact of the matter is people are suffering now.

So it's easier.

And some people may say, well, look at Trump.

He's working fast.

True.

It's easier for him to work fast because right wing agendas are about tearing things down.

It's easier to tear down things and give everybody health care.

But that's why we have to work even harder.

And that's why the conversations and the work starts now.

Democrats like to wait till we're in power to talk about what we do with the power.

That's the problem.

The presidency is only like, what, 100 days to really get the big stuff done.

We have to figure it out now.

So when we're there, we have the plan.

And that's what Project 2025, part of the reason why it's so dangerous for our country and dangerous for us isn't even just what's in it.

but how quickly you can get through it.

And that's the thing we need to be doing now.

And a lot of us are doing it.

And my hope is like, as we, you know, nominate someone in the future, that is something that's front of mind for them.

Don't just say, I'd like to see some candidates not just run on what they're going to do policy wise, but how they're going to do it.

Like explain to us what the order of operations is here, because we're not going to have all the time in the world.

And I think, I just think people are really desperate right now.

Actually, I think for so long, these have been, like you said, two different things.

But for the first time since I've been elected official, I would say that these things have converged.

So a lot a lot of what I see online and a lot of what people are asking for, not everything.

I'm not going to say everything.

is a lot of what I'm hearing when I'm knocking doors at home, is a lot of what people stop me on the street and say, you know, thank you for your work on the internment camp in the Everglades, Alligator Alcatraz.

We need Democrats to fight.

We need like bold solutions.

I'm hearing this, I'll give an example.

I spoke at the Stop the Oligarchy rally in Los Angeles, and I ran into some people that I struck up a conversation with who were talking about the fact that they hated Bernie in 2016.

They're very loyal Democrats.

They were more on the Hillary side, and they hated him.

They thought he was the reason Trump won, and I was like, well, why are you here?

You're at his rally.

And they said, well, I think Democrats need to fight more, and the people I've been seeing fight are the progressives, and I think I get it now.

Yeah.

And so I'm seeing a little bit of a convergence there, which is part of the reason I'm a bit optimistic with the way the party can go, because the party is fractured.

We are figuring things out.

There is no establishment.

And the question is, where does the base push us?

Um, and do we actually go in that direction?

And I, and, you know, I've been questioning a lot, the kind of academic ideological scale that we all talk about.

I don't think the average voter goes into the voting booth and goes, well, where on the ideological scale is this candidate?

Like, I don't think people tip a damn about that.

I think

People want to vote for the people they know, they trust, that are giving them bold solutions that inspire them.

And it's part of the reason why people are all over the place.

I mean, you'll talk with a swing Trump voter and ask him, who's your other favorite politician?

And they'll say Bernie Sanders or something like that.

And to people like us, it might be confusing, but it really isn't because as things get worse in this country, people are just looking for, again, transformation.

Yeah.

I think that's what the average voter wants, transformation.

And they might like in their heart, they might be more of a person to the left or maybe a little to the right.

But the fact of the matter is that when one party represents defending an institution and one party is representing changing it up, even though it's like changing it up so it can work better for billionaires, it's still like change.

The change is going to win, I think, nine out of 10 times, especially in a country where over 60% of our people live paycheck to paycheck.

Things are bad.

Things aren't good.

And so, I mean, I do see a convergence between kind of the online speak and when I run into just everyday people on the streets.

And this is...

I've been spending a lot more time on Florida lakes, like lake culture, which is a pretty MAGA heavy place.

And I speak with a lot of people out there who would complete like decked out in MAGA stuff.

And I'm telling you, I even hear it from these folks too.

They'll say, I disagree with you on everything.

And then I started talking about some progressive solutions I believe in.

And then there'll be, yeah, well, you know, I agree with you on that.

Yeah, that would help me a lot.

So I think that, I don't know, I feel like we, I just feel optimistic about that sort of thing.

And I think the base is yelling for change in the party.

And I think we're seeing it.

I think we're going to see it in 2026.

We've seen a lot of these more populist, progressive candidates come out that are really looking to build a broad coalition around their ideas.

And I think that's going to be the way forward here.

You know, I'll say I'm really this battle that we're in right now.

Last, when was it, March?

I was very, you know, like everybody else, very, very disappointed with the fact that, like, House Democrats stood strong, and then the Senate, they just completely let down, not just us in the Beltway, D.C.

political sense, but the entire nation.

And we know what happened afterwards.

The entire base...

told them Senate leadership and those senators who I think really made the wrong decision, they got held from our base.

And I think that was appropriate and very important.

And it just goes to show that at times when you disagree, we can't have an impact because now we're in lockstep on holding strong right now.

And I think this is really a test, especially on the Senate side, because the House is really standing strong on this.

on if we're able to really stand 10 toes down here.

And I feel a lot more confident now than last time.

Obviously, we're in the middle of this shutdown that Republicans put us in.

They run the House, the Senate, and the White House.

But this is a very moral fight that most people are with us on.

Like, we're doing this for health care.

So I think, you know, time will tell on the Senate side where things go.

I've been a little less...

optimistic with what's going on over there and i think the senate is ripe for a lot of change um on the house side i think we're doing good work right now um especially in this shutdown and i want to see more i'm always bringing this up i want to see more people on the road more people bringing the message out there because the fact of the matter is you can do stunts and stuff up in dc and you know that's important but donald trump has the biggest megaphone here

But the time where you can break through is when you leave the D.C.

bubble and you actually go to the people.

It's harder for Donald Trump to BS that very localized message.

And that's part of the reason I went on the road with Chris Murphy.

And I think you're seeing breakout folks in the Senate like Chris Murphy and folks like that starting to speak out a lot more.

So I know it's a little bit of a non-answer, but just some...

Yeah, I'd say more more on the Senate side.

But but yeah, yeah, exactly.

I mean, this is.

Well, this whole year has been a test and March did not go well.

But I think right now we need people to stay strong.

And I encourage folks to reach out to your members of Congress, even your Democratic members of Congress, your Democratic senators, and then tell them, thank you for holding strong on this and continue to.

We need you to because this is health care for 25 million people.

It's not nothing.

And this is an authoritarian president.

When you don't have all the power you want, use all the power you got.

And that's the moment that we're in right now.

All right.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

And you were just blocked by us by a worker here at the building here.