- [Narrator] Funding for this edition of State of Affairs with Steve Adubato has been provided by Atlantic Health System.

Building healthier communities.

The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

New Brunswick Development Corporation.

Choose New Jersey.

Veolia, resourcing the world.

Operating Engineers, local 825.

NJM Insurance Group.

Serving New Jersey'’s drivers, homeowners and business owners for more than 100 years.

New Jersey'’s Clean Energy program.

Lighting the way to a clean energy future.

And by The New Jersey Education Association.

Promotional support provided by NJ.Com.

Keeping communities informed and connected.

And by Insider NJ.

[INSPRATIONAL MUSIC] - Hi everyone.

I'm Steve Adubato.

We're honored to be joined by the Honorable State Assemblyman Raj Mukherji, who is the state assemblyman of 33rd legislative district.

Good to see you, Assemblyman.

- Good to see you Steve.

Thanks for having me on.

- Listen, I disclose all kinds of things here.

Potential conflicts, relationships, but I need to disclose and we'll do this in post production.

I swear we're gonna get to affordability, taxes, a whole range of childcare, important issues.

You just said to me this is not the first time you've been on with me.

You were on when you were 15.

- That's right, yeah.

23 years ago.

- And you were on because you were a young entrepreneur, is that right?

- Yeah.

I had a, a a software and internet business at the time and, and you had me on the Caucus, New Jersey show.

You've clearly done well.

And the fact that you're dedicating yourself to public service speaks volumes, Hey, listen, the term affordability means different things to different people.

Assemblyman, what does it mean to you?

- Affordability to me means starting with the fundamentals.

Food, housing, education, healthcare.

You should be able to access these things in a first world democracy such as ours in an affluent state such as New Jersey.

- Why has affordability been such a problem in this state?

I mean, property taxes, we know what they are.

Gas prices across the country, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, property values.

If you will purchasing a home, everyone knows how difficult it is.

But the bottom line is people are leaving New Jersey.

Forget about the debate about that.

There are people leaving New Jersey and more will leave.

One action that you believe will help reduce the flow of people paying important taxes to the state revenue, to the state, reduce that flow.

- Well on the one hand, inflation, supply chain, gas prices, all of these challenges, new challenges that New Jerseyans aren't just facing but Americans and people throughout the world, right?

That's just if we freeze this moment in time.

But the property tax issue is one that preceded the global pandemic that we've been dealing with and has led people to leave New Jersey.

I, I don't doubt that for one moment.

And that's why I think this budget, not just the governor's proposal but what legislative leadership Senate President Scutari, speaker Coughlin announced together with the governor within the past week or two, as of the time of filming, means that we will be delivering the most direct cash relief in this budget, through the accelerated anchor property tax relief program than ever before.

It's historic and working families are gonna see 2 billion, over 2 million working families in New Jersey and middle class families are going to receive up to $1,500 in direct property tax relief, up to $450 in rental assistance and in a state where our average property tax bill is almost $10,000.

That's a, an almost 20% reduction.

- So let's, sorry for interrupting Assemblyman.

Then let's be clear.

We're taping at the end of June.

We always put the date up so people know.

To he budget will be struck by the last day of June, legally, hopefully, or the government shuts down.

We know that.

We've been there before.

That being said, this will be seen after.

This anchor property tax program, you are arguing that that direct property tax now, is that a check that goes to these families?

- That's right.

It's gonna be a rebate.

And we.

- One second, who qualifies and who doesn't?

- It's gonna reach the vast majority of property tax payers.

I think $150,000 is.

- It is 150.

- Income limit for $1,500.

I think if you make between 150 and $250,000, you will receive a thousand dollars property tax rebate and renters, tenants with incomes up to $150,000 are gonna receive a $450 direct cash rebate - But here'’s the question I want to ask you.

There are some who argue, you know what?

There's a lot, the state is flush right now.

Federal money has come in the, the COVID money, the federal relief money.

Things are good.

Tax revenues are good, but peaks and valleys, things go up and down.

So Assemblyman, for those who say it's not the time to be spending that money.

It's the time to be putting that money in the so-called rainy day fund for when that downtime hits.

You say.

- I think both things can be true without being in conflict.

In other words, we are seeing a record level of surplus in our revenue collections but we're gonna see a rightsizing of those revenue collections in the months and years ahead.

You know as we face the high inflation, rising interest rates, rising costs of borrowing.

So I think that it does make sense to shore up the raining day, rainy day flood since our own economists and the state treasury folks and the legislative budget folks all are warning us that we might enter into an economic downturn as early as over the past, over the next year, right?

So it makes sense to do that, but at the same time while New Jerseyans are facing these rising costs, it makes sense since we have it to deliver direct relief and cut their property tax bill.

And we wanna get to the point where instead of offering rebates and we're doing that.

We're, we, we've over the past couple of years we have made record investments in terms of debt defeasement in terms of our school funding, in terms of.

- Oh, hold on.

Respectfully Assemblyman, school funding.

Some school funding has been cut.

You're over in the Jersey City area.

I don't know what your situation is.

I think there have been cuts in your community.

I know there have been cuts in my community.

So if in fact we're flush, why is state funding to certain school districts being reduced?

- Absolutely right.

I had a bill in that would actually fix that in terms of the allocation.

I'm talking about the big picture, the aggregate.

- Spending more, but some districts lose, some gain.

Go ahead.

I'm sorry.

- Absolutely right.

And, and unfortunately, impoverished districts, former Abbot districts and other districts have, have faced cuts.

And I have a proposal in a legislative fix of that which would ensure that no district receives below their previous fiscal year's allocation or their pre pandemic rather, their pre pandemic allocation.

-Real quick, we're doing a series, an ongoing series three or four years now.

Reimagine childcare.

Affordable, accessible childcare.

Gimme 30 seconds or less on one action that you believe needs to be done because that's an economic and affordability issue as well.

- Yeah.

Expansion of childcare tax credit is shoring up our childcare providers to make sure that if they face another challenge like the pandemic or closures, we have enough childcare available to everybody and having it available only makes sense if it's accessible to everybody.

That's a fundamental challenge for folks getting back to work, for folks being for, for, for households having double incomes at a time when they need it.

And, and, and so making sure childcare is accessible to all and affordable for all is important.

We're doing that with expanding our early childhood education, with expanding pre-K, and, and several other steps in, in terms of investments where we're also leveraging federal, federal dollars.

- So I was, I was remiss.

I just wanna also clarify before I let you go that you are part of a joint Asian Pacific American caucus in the state legislature.

There, I believe there are seven members in that delegation, correct?

- That's right.

For the first time.

Used to be just two of us.

- Yeah.

Well we need a lot more diversity in the legislature and at every level of government.

Assemblyman, I cannot thank you enough for joining us.

We appreciate it.

Do not let it be 24 more years before you join us.

You were 15, and now you can do the math after that.

No one should go on Wikipedia and look at the math on my end.

Assemblyman, thank you so much.

We appreciate it.

All the best.

- Thanks Steve.

You too.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

(grand music) - [Announcer] To watch more State of Affairs with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- He's back by very popular demand, Dr. Ben Dworkin, Director of the Rowan Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship at Rowan University.

Good to see you, Ben.

- Good to see you Steve.

Thanks for having me back.

- As always.

Listen, we're doing this at the end of June to be seen a little bit later.

Put in perspective the January 6th hearings, the congressional hearings.

President just said, the former president just said the other day, "Hey, listen, they're doctoring these videos.

This was just a simple protest that got out of hand."

That's what President Trump said.

A, is he accurate?

B, why should the rest of the state and the nation care about the January 6th hearings?

- Okay.

So first of all, no, he was not accurate.

What happened on January 6th was an insurrection and it was unprecedented in American history and that's why these hearings are so significant.

And there are three big sort of factors I think we should be considering in terms of the implications of these hearings.

First of all, it's a historical record.

I mean, this is the first time somebody has really done thousands of interviews, just seen footage that the media had not seen before, that the public had not seen before.

So putting it all together officially to say this is what happened, here is the proof here, the people talking about it, that's part of it.

A second part is just that it lays the groundwork for possible criminal proceedings and not just contempt of Congress, which several people have been charged with already, but moving beyond that for official corruption, impeding official government action, intimidation, consumer fraud.

- Inciting a riot?

- Yes, incitement, all of this is possible down the road but it needs to be laid out now and it of course, the third factor is that it's fodder for politics because all of this involves Donald Trump.

And if Donald Trump who remains the key figure in today's National Republican Party and the likely the odds on favorite to be the 2024 presidential nominee, then this has to matter, I think for America because those who are looking at this, those who don't want to see Donald Trump are gonna be using this material, the information from these hearings in order to make that case.

- So Ben, let me ask you this and Rowan University, one of our longtime higher ed partners, Ben and I have had a lot of these conversations offline as well but I wanna put it out here right now.

The big lie, the argument that the 2020 election was stolen, that 70 to 80% of Republicans when polled believe that Joe Biden is not the legally elected President of the United States, that President Trump continues to say the election was stolen, question.

And what happened on the 6th happened on the 6th because of the belief of that.

What do you believe that means, again right behind you the Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship.

What does this have to do with elections and citizenship moving forward?

- Well, I think it just makes it, it's a very challenging time to be an American citizen, which is why places like RIPPAC, the Rowan Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship need to grow and exist in the first place.

It's a challenging time.

You know, we used to be a country where if you laid out the American electorate on a diagram, we looked like a bell curve, right?

We were all mostly in the middles, people right of center, people left of center and then you had the extremes and because of media, because of the politics of our generation.

- And social media because we watch different news programs, we see a different perspective of the world.

We're no longer that bell curve.

Now we're sort of like a two hump camel.

The center has been hollowed out and people are generally on these two sides and this hyper-partisanship, this kind of division makes it tough to come together in any kind of format in terms of the American polity and it's a very challenging time to be a citizen, which is why it's so important to be an engaged, informed citizen right now.

- So along those lines, for people who are saying Steve, seriously you're doing another program talking about January 6th, talking about the election of 2020, talking about President Trump, talking about the insurrection, if you will, the capital.

Shouldn't we be talking about inflation, President Biden, his inability to take responsibility as many would argue legitimately so in the eyes of many that he is not taking responsibility for gas prices, inflation, the Afghanistan situation, a whole range of issues.

Wary in the media including those of us in public broadcasting, we're focusing on the wrong thing.

Move on from January 6th, let's get focused on things that quote as many Republicans say and others "that people quote really care about" Ben.

Is that what we should be doing, what people really care about and then doing that programming.

- Look, I think we could walk and chew gum at the same time.

The American people aren't stupid.

They could do more than one thing and they can focus on more than one thing.

- Can we Ben, can we?

- Yes, absolutely we can.

If people treat the American public like serious people as opposed to saying, "I'm gonna give you three bullet points and that's all you're capable of learning or understanding."

There's subtlety in politics.

There are issues we all face.

You can't ignore January 6th, if for no other reason, then Donald Trump will not ignore January 6th and the 2020 election and he is still out there.

He is the guest who won't leave but you still obviously have issues like inflation and everything else and supply chain that we still have to deal with as well.

- But Ben, here's the thing.

There's a piece that was written by our colleague Tom Moran over at NJ.Com and Star-Ledger.

He talks about quote, "Republican selective laryngitis."

You can pick it up, you can't see that on right there.

Go read Tom Moran, NJ.Com.

Republican selective laryngitis spreading in New Jersey swing districts.

So there are several congressional districts in New Jersey that may in fact, in this 2022 election in November dictate who controls the House of Representatives in Congress in Washington.

The Seventh District with Tom Malinowski, the incumbent Congressman.

Tom Kean Jr., State Senator running against him.

Tom Kane Jr., we've had on many times.

He will not talk about the election of 2020, he will not talk about January 7th.

He does not talk about whether he believes President Trump incited a riot.

He doesn't say anything about whether he thinks President Biden's the legally elected president or not.

Point being there are a whole range of Republicans in Andy Kim's district, Congressman Kim.

He's saying his Republican opponent won't say a word about January 6th.

You said we can't ignore it.

Moran saying many Republican candidates for Congress are ignoring it because it doesn't help them and they have a better chance of winning.

If they do, House is likely to go Republican.

- It's true.

Look, the House is likely to go Republican for a number of different reasons.

The question that I think Americans have is what's the Republican party that's gonna be in charge of Congress's gonna be like.

Are you gonna have people who understand what happened on January 6th and are ready to deal with it?

Hold people accountable and move beyond or you can have people who will cynically ignore everything that happened on January 6th, deny that it happened in many ways and simply try to pass or pull one over the eyes of the American public and the voters of New Jersey.

I think this is part of what elections are for, to hold people accountable and people will hold people accountable because the economy's not doing great and the Democrats are in charge, so you're gonna, there are folks out there who will hold Democrats accountable and there are folks out there who have to hold Republicans accountable for not wanting to say anything, for not wanting to upset that part of their party that will be upset, even if they personally don't agree with that view that nothing really happened on January 6th.

- Last point on this.

So, and again, I know there's a time issue here but I'm struck by people believing they'll often ask me, "so Steve, where are you in the media?

You're left or right?

You with Trump, Biden, who are you with?"

And I'll ask, and I'll say, you know what, I didn't think we were supposed to pick sides.

Meaning, this conversation is about what we saw on that video by January 6th.

Police officers were assaulted, Congress was attacked, the election they attempted to stop it.

That's not a political point of view and that's not some soapbox I'm on.

Is it not fair to say that we in the media have responsibility to say what it is and people can decide for themselves but we don't have to take, we're for or against one candidate or another and that dictates how we cover or analyze these things.

Ben, am I making too much of that?

- No.

I think the media has a crucial role, but you know as we all know, the media is a very diverse lot these days.

Anybody with a cell phone can technically call themselves media and so it's important for the media to be able to present what happened, to show video evidence, to talk to people, to explain to folks what happened.

Whether anyone thinks it's important or not, that's the voter's decision.

Do you care about what happened on January 6th?

If you don't, then you're gonna vote accordingly.

If you do, then you will vote accordingly but someone's gotta tell you what happened on January 6th.

Ben Dworkin from Rowan University, the Public Policy and Citizenship Institute there.

Thank you, Ben.

Appreciate it.

- Thank you Steve, appreciate it.

- Stay with us, we'll be right back.

(grand music) - [Announcer] To watch more State of Affairs with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- We're now joined by Nicole Rodriguez, President of New Jersey Policy Perspective.

Nicole, good to see you.

- Good to see you.

- Great, we'll put up the website for the organization.

Tell everyone what the organization is.

- Sure, so New Jersey Policy Perspective, we're a think tank, and we focus on state level policies that lift up economic, racial, and social justice.

- Got it.

And here's one of the questions, right outta the box, that I've been thinkin' a lot about.

Making New Jersey more affordable means different things to different people.

What does it mean to you and the folks at Policy Perspective?

- Yeah, so thank you for asking that.

Affordability is an issue that is very much a focus of lawmakers across the state, and, you know, particularly with this pandemic has really have elevated the issue of affordability, that has been around for a very for a very long time, especially, here in New Jersey.

So, what we know is that in order to increase affordability is to focus on those who have faced the most barriers to policies that do increase affordability.

- Let's be specific, 'cause it says one of the issues is the broadening the Earned Income Tax Credit.

People use the term all the time, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and I would dare say less than 1% of Americans even know what that means.

What is it and what does it mean to broaden and expand it?

- Sure, there's a federal and a state level Earned Income Tax Credit.

The federal level provides, it's based on income, and it's a credit you receive after filing taxes and it's targeted to lower income people.

And the states, many states like New Jersey, has like a similar credit where you would get a portion of that funding back.

So like right now, we have 40% of the credit.

We would receive additionally, on top of the federal, using state dollars.

- Let me try this.

The issue of childcare is a big issue for us.

We have a Reimagine Childcare series we've been doing for several years that talks about accessibility, affordability, quality childcare.

What is New Jersey Policy Perspective's priority when it comes to childcare?

- So childcare.

- 'Cause there's a tax credit there as well.

- Yeah, we are focused on creating a state level child tax credit.

And we used to have one at the federal level, that expired, so many families are now, you know, they had relied on this extra funding each month to make ends meet.

So, what the state is looking to do, in terms of bills that we have seen, is to create a state child tax credit, because this is such a major household expense.

And currently, the state relies heavily on federal dollars to invest in childcare.

- Well, hold on one second, I wanna be clear.

How much support is there for a state childcare tax credit?

Meaning, it hasn't moved.

It's not being voted on that I know of.

How much momentum and support is there for it now?

- We believe that there is support.

We have, you know, groups across the state are hoping that we could pass a state level child tax credit, and we have heard from many lawmakers in the legislature that they do support this.

So, we're actually pretty optimistic on this one.

- And the governor is a big advocate of this?

- The governor.

Well, we're unclear whether he would advocate for this on his own, but we do know that he is supportive of these policies.

- Okay, lemme try this.

The TANF program, T-A-N-F, what's the acronym stand for?

- Transitional Assistance for Needy Families.

- You and the organization have great concerns about the way the TANF program is playing out and what needs to be improved.

What are they specifically, those concerns?

- So the amount that families get, you have to be absolutely the poorest of the poor to be able to be enrolled in our state welfare program, which is our TANF program.

And there's a lot of hoops and barriers that these families have to play and do to actually get access and continue to get access to relief, any sort of assistance.

So part of the expansion would not only raise a credit of what families would receive, but also removing a lot of the barriers that do exist.

- Let me, let me, try a broader, in the two minutes we have left.

You've got, also, you were looking for more support and relief for undocumented families.

Put all this together, some would argue that's a very "progressive," which is why New Jersey Policy Perspective talks about progressive policies.

Others use the word liberal.

Others, and you know this, the S word is being used more and more, socialism.

Question.

How much of what you are talking about has the potential, Nicole, to fall in this morass of political language that that's a progressive socialist liberal policy.

The country is more down the middle.

That's not what the country wants right now.

And you're smiling, 'cause you know what I'm talkin' about, A, and B, how much harder does it make to get these things done, not just New Jersey, but nationally?

- I think you raise such an important point.

Politics are now being involved into, you know, creating and advocating for basic rights for people who have been disadvantaged by policy over, you know, the historical term and particularly, through this pandemic.

And what we're looking to do, if you make the state affordable and reduce barriers to people who need it the most, who need the most support, then you're creating access for everybody else.

So we focus on those who've been historically left behind, so that we can build a better future for all these families, and so that we can live and thrive in New Jersey.

- So, it's interesting.

People may support the individual policy, but if you call it progressive liberal socialism, all of a sudden you got a problem.

But the policy, the people that are being helped, yeah, we're good with that.

Oh, but that's what you're gonna call it.

Never mind, I'm off my soapbox.

Nicole Rodriguez is the President of New Jersey Policy Perspective.

Nicole, I wanna thank you so much for joining us.

- Thank you so much.

- We appreciate it.

I'm Steve Adubato.

That's Nicole Rodriguez.

We'll see you next time.

- [Narrator] State of Affairs with Steve Adubato Is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Atlantic Health System.

The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

New Brunswick Development Corporation.

Choose New Jersey.

Veolia.

Operating Engineers, local 825.

NJM Insurance Group.

New Jersey'’s Clean Energy program.

The New Jersey Education Association.

(Music playing) NJM Insurance Company has been serving New Jersey policy holders for more than 100 years.

But just who are NJM'’s policy holders?

They'’re the men and women who teach our children.

The public sector employees who maintain our infrastructure.

The workers who craft our manufactured goods.

And New Jersey'’s next generation of leaders.

The people who make our state a great place to call home.

NJM, we'’ve got New Jersey covered.