On September 19th, I sat down with the United States Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill.

It's an important conversation about child care, about the future of, the future of democracy and a whole range of issues.

Now, that interview was clearly taped before House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, then Speaker McCarthy was ousted before Republicans decided what to do about the speakership.

Before there was even a speaker.

Now the question becomes how relevant is that conversation?

Well we think it's very relevant, regardless of who the speaker is or is not.

United States Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill.

- We're honored to be joined by the Honorable United States Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill.

Congresswoman, great to have you with us.

- Thanks for having me.

- There are so many issues to talk about, but I wanna prioritize.

We're involved in a longstanding public awareness initiative around accessible, affordable, quality child care.

You have said, "There's a child care crisis and we're about potentially to be falling off the federal funding cliff for child care."

What exactly does that mean, and what role are you playing to keep us from falling off that cliff, please?

- Well, Steve, first of all, you really have been on a public awareness campaign, and I wanna thank you for it.

Because I think, for too many years, this was seen as a problem of moms, they just had to figure it out on their own.

And I can tell you, my oldest just turned 18 this weekend, and I still have nightmares about how awful it was 18 years ago trying to figure out how I was going to get her into quality and affordable child care and get back to work.

And it was awful then; it's worse now.

So what it means when we talk about falling off that child care cliff at the end of the month, that is when federal funding runs out for our country.

You might've heard about some of the fights we're having down here, I'm in Washington, to keep the government open.

That is when the money that we put in to stabilize child care runs out.

And so I have a piece of legislation to keep that money coming, those grants coming, so that we can keep our child care centers open.

And if this doesn't pass, we estimate about 100,000 children in New Jersey will lose access to child care.

And that doesn't even account for all the children whose parents have not been able to find child care for them.

- So Congresswoman, we're taping this at the end of, toward the end of September.

It'll be seen after that.

So I believe you're saying that the debate, the whatever is going on in Congress right now, particularly with the Republicans, who control the House of Representatives, is about the closing down, the shutting down of the government, the funding of child care.

So say this program is seen in mid-October.

Will we already know if we fell off this cliff?

- We'll know.

We'll know because the money will run out by the end of September.

That is when the government funding runs out for the year.

And so we're working desperately to find ways to keep these centers open.

Because if they shut, it's not easy to reopen child care centers.

The level of certification for child care workers that we require if we're gonna leave them with our children, the facilities, and what is required to have the safety requirements of a child care facility, the number of people that need to be working there, especially in infant care, which is very, you know, very expensive and also is very difficult for young, young children, so these requirements all make it very difficult.

If these centers close down, it will be very hard to reopen them.

- Congresswoman Sherrill, do you actually have any opposition to this?

Because every public official on the local, state, and federal government who we've had on, male, female, every guest, child care, accessible, affordable, quality child care, we're all in.

Well, dollars matter beyond what people say.

Is there opposition either publicly or not for the money part of this, the investment part?

Please, Congresswoman.

- I wouldn't say there is necessarily resistance to this program per se, but these are the conversations that, for me, are the most disappointing.

Because I'll tell you, I came down here in one of the most partisan times that our nation has faced, and yet again and again and again, I find those partnerships with people who agree with what I'm trying to do for New Jersey, work on building those broad bipartisan coalitions and getting legislation passed, and that is becoming harder and harder and harder as our speaker seems to be caving more and more and more to extremists in his own party.

And you know, I've asked my Republican colleagues, "Look, work with us.

You don't have to work with the extremists.

We can get stuff done here.

We can still run this government.

And you don't have to listen to the, quite frankly, the crazies who seem to have come to Congress with no intention of governing this nation."

And so this is one of those key areas where there is so much support for this.

It makes sense.

I can tell you I was, you know, everyone from labor unions, to high-end defense manufacturing, to the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce, everyone understands that this is a critical need if we are going to ensure that parents can get back to work, that our economy can function here in New Jersey.

And so there's no opposition.

The opposition just seems to be to actually credibly running the government down here.

- This is something that really struck me: protecting military women and military families.

The impact of the Roe v. Wade overturning by the United States Supreme Court, what is the connection between that historically important decision after the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision allowing for abortions to take place, legal, safe abortions, on military families, particularly women in the military?

And A and B, and you're doing something about it, please.

- So everyone who's joined our military had the understanding that they would have access to reproductive health care, and they would have those baseline protections of Roe if they joined our military before Roe was overturned.

And I will tell you that when you are serving in the military, you receive orders.

And so you don't get to say, "Oh, I'm not going to go serve in Texas because they now have some of the most draconian, anti-choice laws and some of the worst outcomes for women in the country."

You can't say, "I'm in a high-risk pregnancy, so I don't want to go to that state because that puts my life and the life of my unborn child in danger."

- And then, excuse me.

- You have to- - In Alabama, where Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville uses senatorial courtesy powers to delay military promotions are subject to confirmation hearings.

Here's why I'm saying that.

Are senators and other high-level elected officials in certain states, disproportionately Southern, did they have the influence over which women have access and who don't?

- Well, if you were ordered to go to Texas right now, where 120,000 men and women serve, then you don't have access to reproductive health care services in many cases.

So what the military has done is to say, "Look, we, by law, we're not allowed to pay for your abortion, but we can pay for your travel out of state and we can ensure that you are able to leave, that you are given leave so that you can go seek better reproductive health care," as a minimum of what we should do for our service members and their families.

And that is something that Senator Tuberville is blocking, the travel ban for military women, not allowing them to travel for these services.

But not only that, he is also withholding all the promotions for generals and admirals in our military.

And we estimate that by the end of the year, statutorily, that these admirals and generals will be mandatory forced to retire.

So they won't be able to stay on in those positions.

3/4 of our flag officers across the world, serving in positions across the world will be forced to retire with nobody being promoted into those jobs.

- Before we let you go and vote, quick thing.

Two things, one, remind people of your military service, Congresswoman.

- So I went to the Naval Academy and then I served for almost 10 years as a Navy helicopter pilot and as a Russian policy officer.

And during that time, I did serve in Texas.

I did flight training in Corpus Christi, Texas.

And so this is not some theoretical proposition that I am talking about here.

This is something that happens to many of our servicewomen, and they should have that access.

- Last, last, last question, I promise.

We're doing a series called "Decision 2024: Democracy in Danger," no question mark, in danger.

Hyperbole?

- Sadly, I don't think so.

I think we should all be very cognizant of the people across this country who don't believe in our democracy.

Mitt Romney in a recent article laid out what he sees as people who don't share these values and don't believe in the Constitution, and I think we should all be very concerned about that and ensuring that we vote for people who care about this country.

And when they take that oath to the Constitution, they do, as we say in our military oath, they do so freely and without any mental reservations or purposes of evasion.

- And finally, if members of Congress argue that, as the president, former president, Donald Trump, said, "We need to suspend the Constitution," or he's considering doing that.

For those who opt to believe and say that, "We want Donald Trump to be president, regardless of the rule of law, regardless of how these trials play out, and regardless of whether he abides by the Constitutional peaceful transition of power," there's a question here, trust me, "Doesn't matter, we just want Trump," is that part of the danger to democracy?

- That is not a democracy.

That is an authoritarian government.

So yes, that would be a clear danger to democracy.

- We've held Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill too long.

She has a vote to cast.

And Congresswoman, we thank you for taking the time to be with us.

It will not be the last time.

All the best to you and your family and your colleagues.

- Thank you so much.

- Down in Congress doing the people's work.

Thank you, Congresswoman.

- Thank you.

- You got it, I'm Steve Adubato, that's the Congresswoman.

Stay with us.

- [Narrator] Think Tank with Steve Adubato has been a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

RWJBarnabas Health.

New Jersey Institute of Technology.

New Jersey Sharing Network.

Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.

The New Jersey Education Association.

IBEW Local 102.

Operating Engineers, Local 825.

And by Veolia.

Promotional support provided by Northjersey.com and Local IQ.

And by The New Jersey Business & Industry Association.

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